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Investigation of English History

Investigation of English History
A.T.Fomenko, G.V.Nosovskij
NEW HYPOTHETICAL CHRONOLOGY AND CONCEPT OF THE ENGLISH HISTORY.
BRITISH EMPIRE AS A DIRECT SUCCESSOR OF BYZANTINE-ROMAN EMPIRE.
(SHORT SCHEME) ABSTRACT This article is devoted to the investigation of traditional version of English chronology and English history. It should be mentioned that this tradition was established only in 15-17th cc.(and especially by Scaliger and Petavius) as a result of attempts to construct the global chronology of Europe and Asia at that time. The results of our investigation show that modern version of English history (which is in fact a slightly modernized version of 15-16th cc.), was artificially prolonged backward and became much more long as it was in reality. The real history of England, as it was reflected in written documents, was much more short. The same is true for other countries. In correct version, ancient and medieval English events are to be transferred to the epoch which begins from 9-10th cc. Moreover, many of these events prove to be the reflections of certain events from real Byzantine-Roman history of 9-15th cc. Consequently, the Great Britain Empire is a direct successor of medieval Byzantine Empire. This effect for English history corresponds to the similar “shortening effects” for traditional histories of other countries (Italy, Greece, Egypt, Russia etc.). Such effects were discovered earlier by the authors (see our previous publications). A discussion of the whole problem of global chronology and a history of this problem one can find in [1],[24]. English history is not an exemption from the “rule”. We do not think that all speculations which are suggested here are final ones. Surely, they are subject to further corrections and clarification. Nevertheless, the general concept is quite clear and seems to be a final one. The aim of present work is only to present main points of our new version of reconstruction of the real English history. CONTENTS 1.INTRODUCTION
2. BRIEF REVIEW OF TRADITIONAL ENGLISH HISTORY2.1.The most old English chronicles2.1.1.The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle.2.1.2.Nennius’ “Historia Brittonum”2.1.3.Galfridus Monemutensis’ “Historia Brittonum”. “Histoires of the kings of Britain by Geoffrey of Monmouth”2.1.4.Some other old English chronicles2.2.What were the medieval names for modern cities, nations and countries according to ancient English chronicles?2.3.An overview of traditional concept of English history2.3.1.Scotland and England: two parallel “dynastic streams”2.3.2.English history. Epoch from 1st to 445 A.D. England as the Roman colony2.3.3.Epoch from 445 to 830. Six kingdoms and their union2.3.4.Epoch from 830 to 1040. The epoch is finished by Danish conquest and then by disintegration of Dutch kingdom in England2.3.5.Epoch from 1040 to 1066. Epoch of the Old Anglo-Saxon dynasty and it’s fall2.3.6.Epoch from 1066 to 1327. Norman dynasty and after it – Anjou dynasty. Two Edwards2.3.7.Epoch from 1327 to 1602.3.PARALLELS BETWEEN ENGLISH AND BYZANTINE-ROMAN HISTORY. GREAT BRITAIN EMPIRE AS THE DIRECT SUCCESSOR OF MEDIEVAL BYZANTINE-ROMAN EMPIRE3.1.Rough comparison of dynastic streams of England and Byzantine-Roman empire3.2.Dynasty parallelism between ancient and medieval England from one side and medieval Byzantine empire from another side. General concept of correspondence between English and Byzantine histories3.3.Some details of dynastic parallelism (“parallelism table”)3.3.1.English history of 640-830 A.D. and Byzantine history 378-553 A.D. 275-year shift3.3.2English history of 800-1040 and Byzantine history of 553-830. Rigid 275-year shift3.3.3. English history of 1040-1327 and Byzantine history of 1143-1453. Rigid 120-year shift4.CORRECT ENGLISH HISTORY IS MORE SHORT IN TIME BUT MUCH MORE DENSE IN EVENTS THAN IT IS SUGGESTED BY TEXTBOOKS4.1.Our new concept of English history4.2.In which way the Byzantine chronicles were inserted into the medieval English history (of the island Anglia)?5.OLD ENGLISH CHRONICLES AS ORIGINAL DOCUMENTS WHICH SPEAK ABOUT REAL EVENTS OF 10-13th CENTURIES
5.1.Roman consul Brutus – the first who conquered Britain (and the first king of britts)5.2.Consul Brutus of English chronicles – was he a contemporary of Julius Caesar?5.3.Biblical events in English chronicles5.4.Do we interpret ancient texts in a proper way? Problem of vowels restoration5.5.Geography and chronology of biblical events5.5.1.Problems with traditional geographical localizations5.5.2Where ancient Troy was located?5.5.3. Where Moses traveled in reality?5.6.Why English chronicles suggested that both Russia and England were located on islands?5.7.Where was the land Britain which was conquered by Brutus located? In what direction his fleet cruised?5.8.With whom Brutus fights while conquering of Britain = Albania?5.9.With whom Julius Caesar fights while conquering of Britain = Albania?5.10.Where was London located in 10-11th cc.A.D.?5.11.Who were scots in 10-12th cc.A.D. and were did they live? Where was Scotland located in 10-12th cc.A.D.?5.12.Five original languages of ancient Britain. Which nations used these languages and where did they live in 10-12th cc.A.D.?5.13.Where were located six original English kingdoms Britain, Kent, Sussex, Wessex, Essex and Mercia in 10-12th cc.A.D.?5.14.A shift of originally Byzantine map to the land of modern Great Britain resulted in duplicating of many geographical terms5.15.William I the Conqueror and Hastings battle in 1066 A.D. The fourth crusade in 1204 A.D.5.15.1.Two well-known wars in England and Byzantine empire have the same origin5.15.2English version of William the Conqueror story5.15.3. Byzantine version of the Constantinople’s conqueror5.15.4.A list of correspondences between events from Byzantine and English chronicles5.16.Medieval Russia from the point of view of English chronicles. When did apostle Paul write his message to galats and who they were?REFERENCES1. INTRODUCTION This work belongs to the scope of investigations carried out by authors in order to give a critical analysis of ancient and medieval chronology, and also – to try a reconstruction of real ancient chronology. The whole history of the problem one can find in A.T.Fomenko’s books [1],[24]. In these books some new statistical methods of obtaining true dates for ancient events recorded in old chronicles were suggested. As a result, a new chronology of Europe, Asia, Egypt and Northern Africa based on a statistical investigation of ancient texts, was suggested in [1],[24]. One also can find there a list of all publications by A.T.Fomenko and his colleagues devoted to chronological problems.
This new concept of global history and chronology confirms some ideas which were expressed by different scientists in 16-20th cc. The most important were ideas of famous Russian scientist N.A.Morozov (1854-1946) who had an extremely wide range of scientific interests in many different branches of natural science and history. Very interesting works devoted to the problems of traditional chronology were written by Isaac Newton, J.Gardouin, R.Baldauf, E.Johnson and others.As a result of application of statistical methods to historical science, A.T.Fomenko discovered a “fiber structure” of our modern “textbook in ancient and medieval history”. In such a way we will call a modern chronological tradition in history which is expressed in all our textbooks. It was proved that this “textbook” consist of four more short “textbooks” which speak about the same events, the same historical epochs. These short “textbooks” were then shifted one with respect to other on the time axis and then glued together preserving these shifts. The result is our modern “textbook” which shows the history much longer than it was in reality. To be more precise, we speak here only about a “written” history, i.e., such history which left it’s traces in written documents which finally, after their certain evolution, we possess today. Of course before it, there was a long “pre-written” history, but information about it is lost.Resume is as follows. History which we in principle could learn about today, starts only in 9-10th cc. “A.D.” (i.e., 1100-1200 years ago). And the very name “A.D.” attached to the era which we use now, is not correct. New results concerning the problem of reconstruction of real ancient chronology one can find in two last Fomenko’s books [4,5] devoted to history and chronology.An important step to the reconstruction of real ancient chronology was made by publication of a book [3] written by A.T.Fomenko, V.V.Kalashnikov and G.V.Nosovskij. In this book the true date of compilation of a famous ancient scientific manuscript, the Ptolemy’s “Almagest”, was (approximately) determined as a result of statistical analysis of numerical astronomical data in the “Almagest”. Traditionally it is assumed that the “Almagest” was compiled not later than in 2nd c. A.D. In [3] it is proved that the real date of it’s compilation belongs to the time interval from 7th century to 13th century A.D.Later, in 1992-1993, A.T.Fomenko and G.V. Nosovskij applied new statistical methods to Russian history. In Russian history there also were discovered chronological shifts and duplicates. It proves to be very much different from well-known version of Russian history which was suggested in epoch of Romanov dynasty reign in Russia. The book “Chronology and General Concept of Russian History” by A.T.Fomenko and G.V. Nosovskij is being printed (in Russian).In 1992-1993 authors recognized that the history of development of English chronology and English history itself is a very interesting and important point in the whole scope of global chronology reconstruction. In our analysis of Russian old documents it was necessary to use also some English documents. And immediately we came upon several such amazing facts that, it become quite clear to us that English history (which is rather “spoiled” in modern “textbook”) gives new and important information to the reconstruction of real chronology of Europe and Asia.We tried our best to make this work independent from our previous works. Nevertheless, such dependence exists. That is why we recommend to anyone who really wants to understand the whole problem of reconstruction the English history as it as in reality, to look through mentioned above books and scientific publications by authors. We believe
that this work is good for the beginning and it could serve as a starting point to the reader. We tried to avoid citation from other our works here (as far as it was possible).It is pleasure for us to thank Mrs. Laura Alexander (USA) for her excellent assistance in arranging materials concerning English history. Her energy very much inspired our work on English history.We thank T.N.Fomenko for several good ideas which improved some of our results concerning parallels between English and Byzantine history and also for valuable remarks which made this text better.2. BRIEF REVIEW OF TRADITIONAL CONCEPT OF ENGLISH HISTORY2.1. The most old English chronicles2.1.1. The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle.To understand a material we are going to present here, it would be better if a reader knows main things from English, Roman and Byzantine history. As to Roman and Byzantine history, we assume that it is more or less the case. But old English history is not so generally well-known. That is why we are going to present here a brief review of “English history textbook”.Surely, we could simply suggest that a reader looks through one of modern books concerned with English history before he reads this paper. But all such books are necessarily the secondary texts which, in fact, copy an information from more old texts and documents devoted to English history. The problem is that this coping proves to be not so good (part of information is lost). That is why we prefer to analyse medieval historical texts themselves rather then modern textbooks, which are based on them. An important advantage of these medieval texts is that they were written more close to the time of creation of now traditional global chronological version (it was I.Scaliger’s one). Our experience says that an information about old history was been lost while publishing new and new textbooks from that time up to now. Medieval texts are more valuable for reconstruction of real history.Our analysis was based mostly on three famous medieval English chronicles: Anglo-Saxon Chronicle [2], Nennius’ “Historia Brittonum” [8] and Galfridus Monemutensis’ “Historia Brittonum” [9]. In fact, these texts form a basis for modern concept of old and medieval English history.Also we used well-known “Chronological Tables” which were compiled by J.Blair [6] in 18th c. – beginning of 19th c. These fundamental tables cover all historical epochs which seemed important to experts in the end of 19th century.Now it is assumed that so-called “legendary” English history started from the time of Trojan war, i.e., in 12-13th cc. B.C. Nevertheless a 1000-year period from Trojan war to the epoch of Julius Caesar (1st c. B.C.) is considered usually as a “dark time”.From the time of creation and establishment of modern chronological concept (by I.Scaliger and D.Petavius in 16-17th cc.) it was assumed that “written” English history
starts from 60 B.C. when Julius Caesar conquered the British islands. But it is known today that documents speak about English history only from approximately 1 A.D., i.e. from the rein of Octavian Augustus. It was the 1 A.D. when Anglo-Saxon Chronicle began its records ([2], p.4).The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle consists of several separate manuscripts:Manuscript A: The Parker Chronicle (60 B.C. – A.D. 1070), Manuscript B: The Abigdon Chronicle I (A.D. 1 – A.D. 977), Manuscript C: The Abigdon Chronicle II (60 B.C. – A.D. 1066), Manuscript D: The Worcester Chronicle (A.D. 1 – A.D. 1079), (with twelfth-century addition 1080 – 1130 A.D.), Manuscript E: The Laud (Petersburg) Chronicle (A.D. 1 – A.D. 1153), Manuscript F: The Bilingual Canterbury Epitome (A.D. 1 – A.D. 1058).It is well-known that all these manuscripts duplicate each other in the sense that they all speak about the same events, but in more or less details. That is why all they are placed in the publication [2] parallel to each other in a very convenient manner, which makes it easy to compare different records concerning the same year. Maybe, all these manuscripts have the same written original and in fact represent different scripts of one old chronicle.Anglo-Saxon Chronicle covers an epoch from 1 A.D. to 11th century (except manuscript E which stops in 1153).It is traditionally assumed that all these manuscripts were written approximately in 11-12th cc., just in the form which we have today. But it is only a hypothesis which is strongly based on the Scaliger’s chronology. And it sounds not very natural. For example, manuscript A exists now only in two “copies” and both of them were made only in 16th c. (see [2], p.xxxiii). The original version (from which these two copies were made) was practically burned out in a fire. As to other manuscripts of Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, their history is not clear from [2]. For example, it is not pointed out what were the methods of determining of dates when existing copies were made. One could have an idea that the dating was as follows: if last records of these manuscripts refer to 11-12th cc., then the copies we now posses are necessarily written just in that form in 11-12th cc. Leaving aside other objections, we must say that this speculation in fully based on Scaliger’s chronology. If real dates of last mentioned events change, then such dating of a manuscript would also change.Difficulties with reconstruction of a true story for origin of these manuscripts are well-known among experts. For example David Knowles had to claim that: “The question of provenance and interdependence of the various versions [of the Chronicle] are so complicated that any discussion soon assumes the appearance of an essay in higher mathematics” ([2],p.xxxi).Moreover, G.N.Garmonsway says that any modern analysis of Anglo-Saxon Chronicle is based on the Charles Plummer’s revision (1892-1899) of it’s original edition published by John Earle in 1865. It should be mentioned that manuscripts A and E are again “associated” (G.N.Garmonsway’s expression) with certain persons from 16th century – Archbishop Parker (1504-1575) and Archbishop Laud (1573-1645). Here is his text: “Any account of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle is necessary based on Charles Plummer’s revision of the edition of John Earle (1865) which was published in two volumes by the Oxford
University Press in 1892-9… Plummer’s edition… gives prominence on opposite pages to manuscripts A and E, associated respectively with the names of Archbishop Parker (1504-75) and Archbishop Laud (1573-1645);…The other manuscripts were once in the possession of Sir Robert Cotton (1571-1631), and are to be found in the Cottonian collection of manuscripts in the British Museum”([2],p.xxxi).It seems that all the manuscripts of Anglo-Saxon Chronicle which are available today were actually written (or revised) not earlier than in 15-16th centuries. However, they are considered to be written in this form in 11-12th cc. Probably the only reason for such point of view is that traditional dates of the last events from Anglo-Saxon Chronicle belong to this epoch: 11-12th cc. But such reason is not enough. It is possible that events from 11-12th cc. were described by somebody in 15-16th cc. and we actually possess his secondary text which could be very far from an original version. And also, the dates of events from Anglo-Saxon Chronicle strongly depend on a used chronological concept. If it changes then the dating of Anglo-Saxon Chronicle would change automatically.There is a strong argument which suggests that manuscripts of Anglo-Saxon Chronicle are actually of a rather late origin. The problem is that all these manuscripts use modern “A.D.” era which came into regular practical use only in 15th century. It is a known fact in traditional history. Later we will also present some facts which suggest that the authors of Anglo-Saxon Chronicle were already familiar with J.Scaliger’s chronological concept (16th c.), and by no means – with a chronological concept of Matthew Vlastar (16th c.). It means that Anglo-Saxon Chronicle was written much later then it is usually accepted.The reason for Anglo-Saxon Chronicle to be paid such great attention in our reconstruction of English history is very simple. It turns out that “Thanks to the example of Bede, the Chronicle is the first history written in English to use his mastery innovation of reckoning years as from the Incarnation of Our Lord – “Years of Grace” as they were called in England.”([2],p.xxiv).Concerning the way of presenting dates in Anglo-Saxon Chronicle we should make a remark. It is accepted that in medieval England they used for “A.D.” era the following formula: “Years from the Incarnation of Our Lord”. It is accepted today that this formula was equivalent to the formula “Years of Grace”. But this equivalence in not so evident and requires a special investigation. (We will return to this subject later and discuss it in more details). Note that there is a strange similarity between two well-known names-terms Grace – Greece.Maybe the original (and forgotten today) meaning of a formula “Years of Grace” differs from one which is accepted today. Maybe it was “years in Greece”, “Greek years” or something like this. It is possible also that there is a relation between terms Grace, Greece and Christ. Was the name of Christ associated in some sense with a name of country “Greece”? For example Christ religion = “Greece religion”? It might be because in medieval epoch Greece was a name of Byzantine empire, and another it’s name was Romea, Rome. So Christian, “Roman” religion could be called also as “Greek religion”; but if so then there might be a confusion between “A.D.”, “Christ” era and old “Greek”, Byzantine era which was used sometimes, as well as “A.D.”, with it’s thousands omitted. It could be not obvious which era was actually used in an old documents which indicate “Years of Grace”. Of course, such kind of similarity between different terms could not be considered as very strong arguments supporting any point of view. It play a role of preliminary speculations and should be considered as a serious argument only in the case when it appears (repeats) constantly in a long historical parallelism, when similar
names arise simultaneously for hundreds of years in two different epochs after one of them is shifted in time as a whole and then compared with another one.Anglo-Saxon Chronicle was written in a very laconic manner, it was divided into chapters (fragments) each of them devoted to a certain year. Many years are not described at all (there are some lacunas in the text). It is considered today that Anglo-Saxon Chronicle speaks about events from the beginning of A.D. to 11-12th centuries. See Fig.1. The text of Anglo-Saxon Chronicle seem to be really very old. Absence of long and “beautifully designed” periods in the text (typical for historical literature of 15-16th cc.) suggests that Anglo-Saxon Chronicle is an important historical document which was based on some really ancient records. Surely, it was edited in 16-17th cc. and a main question is: what credit should we give to chronologists of 15-17 centuries who actually dated events in Anglo-Saxon Chronicle as we have it now? 2.1.2. Nennius’ “Historia Brittonum”. Nennius’ “Historia Brittonum” is a rather short text, only about 24 pages in [8]. There exist more then 30 manuscripts of Nennius’ book which are known today (see [8]). “The earliest manuscripts are dated today by 9th or 10th centuries, and the latest – by 13th or even 14th centuries. In some of the manuscripts are indications that the author was Gildas. Nennius is called as the author sufficiently rare. Thus, this manuscript is possibly – compilation… The original text was lost, we do not have it today. But there exists its Irish translation of 11th century” ([8],p.269). Translation was made from the publication: “Nennius et l’Historia brittonum”, P.,1934. Some manuscripts are ended with pages from “Annals Cambriae”, which is considered to be compiled approximately in 954 A.D. Nennius’ “Historia Brittonum” does not have nor chronological subdivision neither any chronological notes except the following two ones: 1) A table titled “About six ages of the world” is placed at the beginning of the “Historia”. It presents time distances in years between some biblical events – and already according to Scaliger’s calculations, which were carried out only in 16th c. 2) Chapter XVI of the “Historia” has a section titled “The ground of the dating” , which speaks about the relative distances (in years) between a few events from English history. In both cases chronological notes are very brief. Resume is that it is unclear, who and when actually wrote the “Historia”. It’s original text does not exist today, a translation which is considered to be carried out in 11th c. The text does not have it’s own chronological scale. Surely, all questions which arise with Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, refer to “Historia” also. Moreover, Nennius’ text is written in a free artistic manner with many stylistic accessories. It suggests that this manuscript is of rather late origin. Such text could be written only in an atmosphere of a deep and well developed literary tradition when many people use writing and reading books and paper is not a treasure.
It is accepted today that Nennius describes certain events in a time interval from the epoch of Trojan war to 10-11th cc. A.D. In fact it is a result of only a traditional chronological concept (which suggests that short Nennius’ text covers an extremely large 2000-year historical period) that one could find today giant lacunas in chronology of “Historia”. Fig. 1 shows by a dotted line the epoch which is considered to be covered by “Historia”. According to traditional chronological concept Nennius easily omits whole centuries in his story, makes giant chronological jumps without any explanations. He seems not to notice it at all and continues his story after such jumps as if nothing was missed. 2.1.3. Galfridus Monemutensis’ “Historia Brittonum”. “Histories of the kings of Britain by Geoffrey of Monmouth”. It is generally accepted today that this chronicle was written in 30th or 40th of 12th century ([8], p.196) by Galfridus Monemutensis who based it on Nennius’ text, sometimes even copying Nennius “errors” ([8], p.231, comments to chap. 17; see also [8], p.244). Galfridus Monemutensis’ book is rather big one – about 130 pages in [8]. In opposition to Anglo-Saxon Chronicle his text has no chronological subdivision (no indication about years). His writing style was rather complicated, with many accessories, moralities, philosophical excursions et cetera. Galfridus is even considered to be not a historian only but also a poet. Surely, the traditional point of view that Galfridus wrote his book after Nennius, is correct. It is known also that Galfridus made an extensive use of “Ecclesiastic History of the English Nation” (in Latin) by Bede Venerable ([9], p.244). It is assumed that Bede’s “History” covers 597-731 A.D. It is remarkable that modern commentators point out “the extremely clear and evident Galfridus’ orientation of the antique tradition” ([9], p.207). For example, Galfridus not only used ancient plots, but also copied a stylistic manner of ancient authors ([9], p.207). It seems that Galfridus writes his book being fully influenced by the atmosphere of antiquity. It was pointed out that Galfridus copies some of his topics directly from ancient authors (for example, from Stacius), but does not give any references ([9], p.236). Galfridus Monemutensis’ “Historia Brittonum” was extremely popular in medieval times. “Today we have about two hundreds (! – Auth.) copies of his “History”,… which were written in different places starting from 12th century and until 15th century, i.e., up to appearance of the first printed edition” ([9],p.228). At first time “Historia” was printed in Paris in 1508. Fig. 1 shows a historical epoch which is assumed to be covered by Galfridus’ text (according to traditional chronology). Notice that it is approximately the same time interval as for Nennius’ case: namely, from Trojan war up to 8th century A.D. Of course, Galfridus’ book is much bigger then Nennius’ one, but being referred again to the giant 2000-year time interval, it could not cover it all without huge lacunas. And really, traditional chronology states that Galfridus “omit” large historical epochs. But it is strange, that Galfridus himself does not mind it at all. He calmly continues his story without notifying a reader that he sometimes actually misses whole historical epochs in his chronology. 2.1.4. Some other old English chronicles In our work we use also some other English chronicles of 9-13th centuries, particularly those represented in a book by V.I.Matuzova “English medieval documents” [10]. Here
we would like to present a very interesting list which was compiled by V.I.Matuzova as a result of her investigation of these chronicles rather then to characterize them in details. We will discuss this subject in the next section. 2.2. What were the medieval names for modern cities, nations and countries according to ancient English chronicles? Many people use to think that medieval chronicles refer to such well-known areas (regions) as England, London, Russia, Kiev etc. with just the same names as today, and so in general there is no problem to recognize what place old documents are speaking about. Sometimes, in more new documents, it is actually the case. But in more old, original documents such situation seems to be rather an exception then a rule. Old chronicles very often use absolutely different geographical names and it is a nontrivial task to understand what regions (areas, towns et cetera) they are really speaking about. It is also a problem that old documents in general use many different names for each country, land, nation etc. Very often these names have nothing to do with those we use today. The names of ancient nations, countries and cities which are known today, were fixed only in 18-20th centuries. But before that time there were various opinions concerning what names to use. These opinions were often quite different from each other. It is a very interesting question to analyse the names which were used in medieval English documents for cities, nations and countries which are so well-known today with their modern names. It turns out after such analysis, that medieval authors seem to have quite different views on old and ancient history. That is why modern specialists in history usually claim that almost all medieval people were “extremely wrong” in history, that they had “fantastic concepts” about it, “confused and mixed historical epochs”, “did not distinguish antiquity and medieval epoch” and so on. In a following list some medieval “synonyms” of modern accepted names and terms are presented. Each entry of the list shows a modern term and is followed by it’s medieval synonyms. AZOV SEA=Meotedisc lakes, Meotedisc fen, Maeotidi lacus, Maeotidi paludes, palus Maeotis, paludes Maeotis, paludes Maeotidae, Paluz Meotidienes.ALANIA=Valana, Alania, Valana, Valvy, Polovtzy ?! – see below.ALBANIANS=Liubene, Albani.AMAZONS LAND=Maegda land, Maegda londe, Amazonia.ALBANIANS=Maegda land, Maegda londe, Amazonia.BULGARIANS=Wlgari, Bulgari, Bougreis.BUG RIVER=Armilla.VANDALS=Wandali, Sea-cost Slavs.HUNGARY =Hungaria, Hunia, Ungaria, Minor Ungaria.BYZANTINE EMPIRE=Graecia, Constantinopolis, VALACHIANS=Coralli, Blachi, Ilac, Blac, Turks ! (see below).VALACHIA =Balchia.VOLGA RIVER=Ethilia.
GALITZK-VOLYNSK RUSSIA=Galacia, Gallacia.GERMANY=Gothia, Mesia, Theutonia, Germania, Allemania, Jermaine.HIBERNIC OCEAN=The English Channel, Hibernicum occeanum.HIBERNIA=Ireland (!)GOTHIA=Germany, Island Gotland, Scandinavia, Tavrida (=old name of Crimea).GUNNS=Hunni, Huni, Hun.DACKS=Dani, Daneis.DENMARK=Denemearc, Dacia, Dania, Desemone.DUTCH=Daci, Dani, Norddene, Denen.DARDANELLES (the strait)=St. Georg strait = branchium Sancti Georgii.DERBENT (passage)=Alexander gates = Alexandres herga, Porta ferrea Alexandri, claustra Alexandri.DNEPR RIVER=Aper.DOGI=Russians (see below).DON RIVER=Danai, Thanais, Tanais.MEDIEVAL RUSSIA=Susie,Russie,Russie,Rusia,Russia,Ruthenia,Rutenia,Ruthia,Ruthena,Ruscia,Russcia, Russya,Rosie.DANUBE RIVER=Danubius,Hister,Danuvius,Damaius,Deinphirus,Danube.IRON GATES=see “Derbent”.IRELAND=Hybernia.ICELAND=Ysolandia.CAUCASUS=beorg Taurus,Caucasus.CASPIAN SEA =Caspia garsecge,mare Caspium.CASSARIA=Chasaria (! (see below)KIEV=Chyo (!), Cleva (!), Riona (!),CHINESE=Cathaii.CORALLS=Wlaches (see above), Turks (see above),RED SEA=mare Rubrum.ENGLISH CHANNEL=Hibernic ocean , Hibernicum occeanum.MARBURG=Merseburg.MESIA=Moesia, Germany (see above),MONGOLIANS=Moal, Tatars (see above), NARVA=Armilla.GERMANS=Germanici,Germani, Teutonici,Theutonici,Allemanni.NETHERLANDS=Frisia, Arise.NORMANS=Nordmenn.OCEAN=Garsecg, Oceano, Oceanus, Occeanus,Ocean.PECHENEGS (medieval neighbours of Russians)=Getae.
POLOVTZY (medieval neighbours of Russians)=Planeti, Captac, Cumani, Comanii,Alani, Values, Valani.(See Comment 1.)PRUSSIA=Prutenia (!).(P-Rutenia = P-Russia).PRUSSES=Prateni, Pruteni, Pructeni, Prusceni, Praceni, Pruceni.RIONA=Kiev (see aboveRUGS=Russians, , Sea-cost, Slavs (see below)RUSSIANS=Russii, Dogi (!), Rugi (!), Rutheni (!), Rusceni.RUTHENS=Russians (see above)THE ARCTIC OCEAN=Sciffia garsecg, Occeanus Septentrionalis, mare Scythicum.SITHIA=Scithia (see above)SCANDINAVIANS=Gothi.SCYTHS=Scithes, Scythae, Cit (!).SCITHIA=Sithia, Barbaria, Scithia, Scythia, Sice (!).SEA-SIDE SCLAVI=Winedas, Wandali, Roge. TAVR=Caucasus (see above)TAVRIDA (CRIMEA)=Gothia (!!!) TANAIS=Don (see above)TYRRHENIAN SEA=mare Tyrene.TATARS (MONGOLS)=Tartareori, gens Tartarins, Tartari, Tartariti, Tartarii, Tattari, Tatari, Tartarii, Thartarei.TURKS=Coralli,Thurki,Turci,Blachi, Ilac, Blac (!!!).URAL MOUNTAINS=Riffeng beorgum, Hyberborei montes, montes Riph(a)eis, Hyperborei montes.FRANCE=Gallia, Francia.FRISIA=The Netherlands (see above.)CHASARIA=Cassaria, Cessaria (!!!).CHASARS=Chazari.CHIO=Kiev (see above)SCOTLAND=Scotia, Gutlonde.BLACK SEA=Euxinus, Pontius, mare Ponticum, mare Majus.CHINGIS-CHAN=Cingis, Churchitan, Zingiton, Chircam, Cliyrcam, Gurgatan, Gurgatan, Cecarcarus, Ingischam, Tharsis (!), DAVID (!), PRESBYTER IOHANNES (!!).JAROSLAV THE WISE (Kiev Princeps Magnus)=Malesclodus, Malescoldus. Juriscloth (= Jurius- Georgius), Juliusclodius (= Julius-Clodius). Julius Claudius.One remark about Jaroslav the Wise. He was known in medieval England as “Malescoldus”. According to M.N.Alexeev [12] there were also some other names which were applied to Jaroslav the Wise in Western historical tradition: Juriscloht (from Jurius-Georgius),Juliusclodius (!), (the last form of Jaroslav’s name was used by Norman historian of 12th century – Gijom), Julius Claudius, (this form used by Orderic Vitali).Let us present a typical example of old English historical text: “He escaped to the
kingdom of Dogs, which we prefer to call RUSSIA. When the king of [this] land – MALESCLODUS – learned about him, he was given a great honor” ([13],[14]).Here is a Latin original text: “Aufugit ad regnum Dogorum, quod nos melius vocamus Russiam. Quem rex terrae Malescoldus nomine, ut cognovit quis esset, honeste retinuit” [13].Imagine please reading this old text without looking at the modern comments which suggest that Dogs Kingdom means the same as Russia. The text would look like this: “He escaped to the Kingdom of Dogs. When the king of that land learned about him, he was given a great honor.”Most probably such text would be understood as a story treating some medieval events in England or Scotland. The word “Dogs” seems to designate a population in some part of England or Scotland and the name “Malescoldus” very much looks like a name of medieval English or Scottish king. Such an interpretation looks rather natural. One knows from Scottish history, for example, that there were several kings with a name “Malcolm”, close to “Malescoldus”: Malcolm I (943-958), Malcolm II (1004-1034), Malcolm III (1057-1093) etc.But such interpretation of this text would definitely transform some of ancient Russian events into English ones, i.e., into ones which are thought to happen on the land of modern England. This example suggests that even a direct understanding, not to say about an interpretation, of an old historical text could be rather ambiguous.Differences between medieval English writer’s opinion and modern way of understanding and interpretation of medieval terms occur for texts written in 9-15th centuries (not so old texts, from the point of view of modern tradition). It means that there exist several possibilities to interpret medieval documents. The way of such interpretation which is in general use now, proves to be not unique. It is only one of possible ways, maybe not the best one. We are going to show here that this standard way is really not enough supported by original documents. The above vocabulary of synonyms (medieval terms-duplicates) is very useful for our analysis of English history.2.3. An overview of traditional concept of English history 2.3.1. Scotland and England: two parallel “dynastic streams” Fig. 1 shows a rough scheme of the English history as it is considered today. The beginning of English history is placed in the 1st century B.C. (Julius Caesar’s conquest of England). Starting at this moment and going up to 400 A.D., English chronicles talk in fact about Roman history. Sometimes they only mention that certain Roman emperor visit England. According to English chronicles there were no independent kings in England before 400 A.D.We will take J.Blair’s “Chronological tables” as a source of information about general structure of English chronology. These tables were compiled in the end of 18th c., but the new information which became available after that time, have not changed the whole picture of English history and so this information is not very important for us now.In 5th century A.D. the Roman power in England came to the end and in that time the first English kings appeared. It was a moment when English history divided into: a) history of England and
b) history of Scotland.In other words, two dynastic streams began in 5th c.:a) English stream and b) Scottish stream.These two dynastic streams develop in parallel up to 1603 when they transformed into a single dynastic stream of the Great Britain.In 404 A.D. the long dynasty of Scottish kings began with the king Fergus I. It ends in 1603 when a united kingdom of Great Britain appeared with it’s first king Jacob I (1603-1625). Scottish dynasty looks “very good organized”: it practically does not have simultaneous reigns of different kings, it does not have breaks and epochs of anarchy also. Being represented graphically on a time axis, this dynasty covers a 1200-year time interval from 404 to 1603 A.D. in a very nice, extremely “regular” manner: reigns of Scottish kings cover one by one without intersections all this time interval. It is a fine example of “carefully written history”. See dotted line in the Fig.1. The absence of simultaneous reigns suggests that Scotland was a “geographically homogeneous” kingdom: it never was divided into several independent parts.English history shows a strong contrast to Scottish one in it’s structure.2.3.2. English history. Epoch from 1st to 445 A.D. England as the Roman colony. Time period from 60 B.C. to the beginning of the era A.D. is considered today as an epoch of conquest of England by Roman army under the command of Julius Caesar.Period from 1st century A.D. to 445 A.D. is considered to be an epoch of Roman occupation of England. England was a Roman colony at that epoch, and there were no English kings, because England was ruled formally by Roman emperors themselves. The description of this period in Anglo-Saxon Chronicle is in fact a compilation from Roman history of 1st – 5th (middle) centuries A.D. as it appears in Scaliger’s version of chronology.It was 409 A.D. when, according to the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, Romans were defeated by Goths, leave England and their power was never restored after that date: “In this year the city of Romans was taken by assault by the Goths, eleven hundred and ten years after it was built. Afterwards, beyond that, the kings of the Romans ruled no longer in Britain; in all they had reigned there four hundred and seventy years since Julius Caesar first came to the country” ([2],p.11).2.3.3. Epoch from 445 to 830. Six kingdoms and their union.From 445 A.D. we see six kingdoms on the English land. Each of these kingdoms has it’s own dynastic stream of rulers. Namely they areBrittany = Britain, Saxons = Kent, Sussex = South Saxons,
Wessex = West Saxons, Essex = East Saxons, Mercia.These six kingdoms exist up to 828 A.D. when they all are destroyed in a war and instead of them one kingdom is established – the kingdom of England. It is the time of Egbert, who becomes the first king of united England. The time of about 830 A.D. could be called, following [6],[7], as the end of Six Kingdoms. “It was 829 A.D., the time of Wessex king Egbert, when all Anglo-Saxon kingdoms united into one feudal kingdom” [11, p. 172]. See Commentary 2 which speaks about the term “Saxon”.2.3.4. Epoch from 830 to 1040. This epoch is finished by Danish conquest and then by disintegration of Dutch kingdom in England. Beginning from 830 A.D. English chronicles speak about only one dynastic stream of kings (in united kingdom of England).In the period 1016-1040 A.D. there was a crucial point in English history. In 1016 Danish king Cnut Danish the Great occupied England. He become the king of England, Denmark and Norway simultaneously. But his state proved to be not stable and after his death in 1035 it was divided. A representative of old English dynasty Edward “The Confessor” (1042-1066) became a king in England after that division. The year 1040 is represented in the Fig.1 as one of the most important break points in English history.2.3.5. Epoch from 1040 to 1066. Epoch of the Old Anglo-Saxon dynasty and it’s fallThe reign of Edward “The Confessor” finished in 1066 A.D., which is a well-known date in English history. In that year Edward died and after that England was occupied by Normans with their leader William I Conqueror the Bastard. In 1066 William the Conqueror defeated English-Saxon king Harold in Hastings battle and as a result became an English king himself. Period of his reign was 1066-1087. This well-known date (1066 A.D.) is also represented in the Fig.1.2.3.6. Epoch from 1066 to 1327. Norman dynasty and after it – Anjou dynasty. Two Edwards.This epoch starts with the beginning of Norman dynasty which ruled England up to 1153 or 1154 ([7], p. 327). Just after it the next, Anjou dynasty started in England. It existed from 1154 to 1272 ([7], p. 327).In 1263-1267 a civil war broke out in England ([11], p.260). After that, in the end of 13th c.- beginning of 14th c., the new monarchy was established in England. First kings in this new dynasty were Edward I (1272-1307) and Edward II (1307-1327). In the end of the considered time period there was a war between England from one side and Wells, Scotland and Ireland from another side. England tried to occupy these regions but it’s attempt was not successful. In 1314 Scots won.2.3.6. Epoch from 1327 to 1602.This period is started with the reign of Edward III (1327-1377) and is finished with the establishment of Great Britain as a union of England and Scotland.
The last period from 1600 to the present time is a well-known history, which we do not doubt and do not analyse here.Resume.We see that English history could be divided into several periods which are separated by well-known “break point” dates. We argue that these division is not occasional one. It reflects the existence of duplicates and chronological shifts in English history.3. PARALLELS BETWEEN ENGLISH AND BYZANTINE-ROMAN HISTORY. GREAT BRITAIN EMPIRE AS THE DIRECT SUCCESSOR OF MEDIEVAL BYZANTINE-ROMAN EMPIRE.3.1. Rough comparison of dynastic streams of England and Byzantine-Roman Empire.We saw that old English chronicles claim that England was a Roman colony for the first 400 years of it’s history. Moreover, when they speak about England at that times, they speak more about Rome and Byzantine empire then about England itself. That is why an idea of comparison of English and Roman-Byzantine dynastic streams seems quite natural. For this purpose we used the Global Chronological Map, which was already made by A.T.Fomenko including dynastic streams of Rome, Byzantine empire and England.Even first glance on this map shows a surprising statistical similarity of general structure for density of reigns in Roman-Byzantine empire and in English dynastic streams. Such specific “density picture” exists only for these two dynastic streams – Roman-Byzantine and English ones. Now we are going to describe this picture.Consider a partition of time interval from 1st to 1700 A.D. by decades. Let us calculate the number of kings in England whose reigns intersect with a certain decade. For example if some decade is covered by a reign of only one king then let us assign number 1 to this decade. If it is covered by two reigns then we assign number 2 to it, and so on. As a result of this procedure we obtain a graph which shows us how many kings ruled inside each decade. We call this graph as “density graph” for a given dynastic stream.Because of absence of kings in England before 400 A.D. the values of density graph in that time interval are zero. Approximately in 440 A.D. there were established 6 dynasties in England (six kingdoms, see above) which existed up to (approximately) 830 A.D. when English kingdoms were united. After that union there was only one English dynasty up to present time [2].Similar procedure was applied to the dynastic stream of Roman-Byzantine empire from 1st to 1500 A.D. Information about all Roman and Byzantine emperors of 1st-15th centuries was used. >From 1st c. to 4th c. all Roman emperors are supposed to stay in Italian Rome (and in it’s colonies), and after 330 A.D. another Roman dynasty in New Rome = Constantinople appeared. So, up to 6th c. there were two parallel Roman dynastic streams (sometimes they had intensive intersections). In 6th c. after a known Gothic war western Rome lost it’s status as emperor’s residence. From that time only one Roman dynasty stream in Constantinople = New Rome was existing constantly up to 1453. In 1453 after siege of Constantinople by Turks this stream was finished.
The result of our calculations is shown in the Fig.2. There are two curves in the Fig.2. At the bottom one can see a density graph for Roman-Byzantine empire, and on the top – for England. Note that English chronology is shifted down as the whole block by approximately 275-year shift.Both graphs look very similar. Both of them start with a period of low density and then, at the same moment the density increases very sharply. Periods of such high density have approximately the same length and the same amplitude in both cases. Then the sharp fall of density occurs simultaneously in these graphs. After that both of them are approximately constant. Their value changes mostly in a range of 1-2 reigns per decade for remaining several hundreds years.High density zone in English chronology is located approximately in 445-830 A.D., and for Roman-Byzantine empire this zone constitutes 170-550 A.D. The length is approximately 380 years in both cases. The duration of the historical periods in England and in Roman-Byzantine empire being compared constitutes about one and a half thousand years.We should say once more that such specific density graphs could not be find in other dynastic streams. It is a feature of English and Roman-Byzantine history only.Fig.3 compares density graphs for England and Roman-Byzantine empire in a very rough way: only high density zones are represented from the graphs. Fig.3 clearly shows that the chronological shift between English and Roman-Byzantine history is equal to approximately 275 years.Of course, above method of comparison for two different histories is very rough and could not be considered as a basis for any statements. But such similarity for density graphs is probably a reflection of the same origin of these two dynastic streams (on a long time period). It is also possible that one of them is a reflection of another one. Moreover, some well-known facts from old English history could support this possibility.For example, it is well-known that the old name of England and English people was not “England” but “Anglia”, “Angles” (from “Angel”), maybe “Angeln” ([2], p.12-13,289). Term “Angels” as a name of population appears in Anglo-Saxon Chronicle at a date 443 A.D. After that this term is used constantly. The first king which was called as “king of Anglia (England)” was Athelstan (925-940) ([7],p.340).Note that “Angels” was also a famous noble feudal family in Byzantine which includes Byzantine emperor dynasty of Angels (1185-1204) ([15], p.166).The natural question arises: may be the name “England” – “Angels” – “Anglia” is the reflection of the name of Byzantine dynasty Angels of 11-12th cc.?It was only some preliminary remarks. They could only to suggest that some connection between English and Byzantine ancient history seem to exist. More careful analysis says that these histories on a long time period are the same.Remark. When we speak about a “dynasty stream” we mean simply a sequence of kings in a certain kingdom which is ordered in time. We do not care about family relations
between these kings (which is usually included in term “dynasty”).3.2. Dynasty parallelism between ancient and medieval England from one side and medieval Byzantine Empire from another side. General concept of correspondence between English and Byzantine histories.We have discovered that there exists a strong parallelism between durations of reigns for English history of 640-1327 A.D. from one side and Byzantine history of 378-830 A.D. continued by Byzantine history of 1143-1453 A.D. from another side. This parallelism is represented in a visual form at the bottom of Fig.1.More precisely, we discovered that:1) Dynastic stream of English kings from 640 to 1040 A.D. (400-year period) is a duplicate (reflection) of Byzantine dynastic stream from 378 to 830 A.D. (452-year period). These two dynastic streams coincide after 210-year chronological shift.It means that there exists a subsequence (“dynastic stream”) of English kings whose reigns cover time interval 640-1040 and a subsequence of Byzantine emperors whose reigns cover time interval 378-830, such that they duplicate each other. Note that not all kings or emperors from these epochs are included in those dynastic streams. It is possible because often there were several corulers (i.e., kings or emperors which ruled simultaneously).2) The next period of English kingdom history: from 1040 to 1327 (287-year period) duplicates Byzantine dynasty history from 1143 to 1453 A.D. (310-year period). These two dynastic streams coincide after 120-year chronological shift.3) Dynastic stream of Byzantine emperors from 830 to 1143 also duplicates the same English dynastic history of 1040-1327. It is quite natural because Byzantine history has it’s own duplicates inside it. In particular, Byzantine history of 830-1143 duplicates Byzantine history of 1143-1453. For details see [1],[24].4) The ends of time intervals from English history duplicating Byzantine history coincide with the break points in English history which we pointed out earlier.5) The ends of time intervals from Byzantine history duplicating English history also prove to be certain natural break points in Byzantine history. They generate a partition of the whole Byzantine history into 4 parts which we will denote by Byzantine empire-0, Byzantine empire-1, Byzantine empire-2 and Byzantine empire-3.3.3. Some details of dynastic parallelism (“parallelism table”)3.3.1. English history of 640-830 A.D. and Byzantine history of 378-553 A.D. 275-year shift.We used J.Blair’s Tables [2] as the first main source of chronological information and Anglo-Saxon Chronicle as the second one. Below we use an abbreviation ASC for Anglo-Saxon Chronicle. Note that sometimes different chronological tables contain a slightly different data, but these differences do not influence the parallelism which we are going
to present here.English historyByzantine historyEnglish history of 640-830. Wessex kings – one of the six kingdoms in England of 400-830. This dynastic stream is a part of the dense sequence of kings whose reigns cover the time axis with high multiplicity. See Figs.2,3.Byzantine history of 378-553. Byzantine emperors dynasty starting from the foundation of New Rome = Constantinople. This dynastic stream is a part of the dense sequence of kings whose reigns cover the time axis with high multiplicity. This period of Byzantine history is denoted as Byzantine-0 on Fig.1. See Figs.2,3.Commentary. Durations of reigns are shown in brackets (rounded off to whole years). In the left column the whole list of English kings is presented. In the right column almost all Byzantine emperors appear. Only absent are names of some emperors with very short reign and co-emperors of those ones who are presented here. Note that all English kings (with only few exceptions of very short reigns) are included in this parallelism.1. Cenwalch 643-672 king of Wessex and 643-647 as the king of Sussex. He ruled 29 or 25 years, if we consider only his rule in Wessex (after 647 A.D.)1. Theodosius I The Great 378 or 379 – 395 (16)Queen Seaxburh 672-674 (2), wife of K.Cenwel. Short rule?2. Cens 674-686 (12) according to Blair. In Anglo-Saxon Chronicle we see here two kings: Escwine + Centwine (9 years in total)2. Arcadius 395-408 (13) Caedwalla 686-688 (2). Short rule?3. Ine 686-727 (39) according to Blair and (37) according to Anglo-Saxon Chronicle (= ASC)3. Theodosius II 408-450 (42)4. Aethelheard 727-740 (13), and (14) according to ASC4. Leo I 457-474 (17)5. Cuthread 740-754 (14) accor- ding to Blair and (17) in ASCSigeberht 754 (1). Short rule5. Zeno 474-491 (17) (he ruled two times)?
6. Cynewulf 754-784 (30) accor- ding to Blair and (31) in ASC]6. Anastasius 491-518 (27) 7. Beorhtric 784-800 (16)7. Justin I 518-527 (9)8. Egbert 800-838 (38). In 828 A.D.(i.e., at the 28th year of his rule) he consolidated all six kingdoms into one – Anglia. The last 10 years he ruled as the king of Anglia. He is consi- dered as distinguished king in English history 8. Justinian I The Great. In 553 A.D.(i.e. at the 26th year of his rule) he defeated the Goths (this is well-known Gothic war) and became unique emperor in Roman-Byzantine empire. He ruled during his last 12 years without any corulers. Well-known emperor in Byzantine history3.3.2. English history of 830-1040 and yzantine history of 553-830. Rigid 275-year shift.English epoch of 830-1040. Anglia after consolidation into one kingdom (see Blair [6]).Byzantine epoch of 553-830. Is denoted as “Byzantine empire-1″ in the Fig.1.9. Aethelberht 860-866 (6)9. Justin II 565-578 (13)10. Aethelbald 857-860 (3)10. Tiberius Constantinus 578-582 (4)11. Aethelwulf 838-857 (19)11. Maurice 582-602 (20)12. Aethelred 866-872 (6)12. Phocas 602-610 (8)Here the old English chroniclers transposed two kings, namely – the kings Aethelwulf (see No.11) and Aethelberht (see No.9) were placed in another order (their Byzantine originals are Justin II and Maurice). This confusion has a simple explanation: all four English kings of this period have very similar names beginning from “Aethel”.13. Alfred The Great 872-900 (28) according to Blair and 871-901 (30) according to Bemont and Monod ([7],p.340)13. Heraclius 610-641 (31)14. Edward the Elder 900-925 (25)14. Constans II Pogonatus 641-668 (26)15. Athelstan 925-941 (16). It is supposed today that he was the first who took the name king of Anglia ([7],p.340)15. Constantine IV 668-685 (17)
16. Confusion: the war with Northumbria. The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle mentions about three main kings of this period: Edmund I 941-948 (7), Eadred 948-955 (7), Eadwig 955-959 (4). All these kings ruled relatively short period16. Well-known confusion in Byzantine history in the end of 7th century – beginning of 8th century. Here there are several emperors with a short rules: Leontius II 695-698 or 694-697, Tiberius III 697-704 or 698-705, Justinian II 705-711, Philippicus Bardanes 711-713, Anastasius II 713-715 or 716, Theodosius III 715 or 716-717Thus, both confusion epochs (English and Byzantine) are matched under the rigid chronological shift. We did not discuss here the details because of mess structure of the chronicles of this time period17. Edgar 959-975 (16)+ Edward “The Martyr” 975-978 (3), and totally (after summation) they give 19 years. Their names are similar and consequently their union is natural17. Leo III Isaurian or the Syrian 717-741 (24)18. Aethelred II “The Unready” 978-1013 (35)18. Constantine V Copronimus 741-775 (34)19. Cnut The Great Danish 1017-1036 (19). His death indicates the disintegration of Danish empire. Thus, this epoch is finished by the well- known event in the history of Anglia. Let us note that this fragment of English history is matched with Byzantine epoch under 210 (or 275)-year shift (approximately)19. Constantine VI Porphyrogenitus 780-797 (17). Let us note that now we are in the end of historical epoch which was marked out in [1] and [24] as Byzantine empire-1 (527-840). Thus, in this column of our table we came to some important turning-point in Byzantine historyThe old English chronicles placed in the end of this epoch (in history of Anglia) two “short” kings: Harold I Danish (1036-1039, ruled 3 years) and Harthacnut (1039-1041, ruled 2 years). We did not find the Byzantine duplicate-original for Harthacnut, but the original-duplicate for Harold I will be demonstrated below
We continue the motion along English history in the left column of the table. The parallel with Byzantine history will continue (in the right column). But this parallel becomes more clear and evident if we take the next epoch “Byzantine empire-3″ (1143-1453) instead of the epoch “Byzantine empire-2″ (Fig.1). As we explained before, these two epochs of Byzantine history are parallel, i.e. they are duplicates (of course, not identical). Consequently, we will list in the right column of the table the emperors from “Byzantine empire-3″ and also will indicate here their duplicates from “Byzantine empire-2″. And we will see that the parallelism between English and Byzantine history will continue until the fall of Constantinople in 1453.3.3.3. English history of 1040-1327 and Byzantine history of 1143-1453. Rigid 120-year shift.English epoch of 1040-1327Byzantine epoch of 1143-1453. Is marked as “Byzantine empire-3″ in the Fig.1. It is the original for “Byzantine empire-2″20. Edward “The Confessor” 1041-1066 (25)20. Manuel I Comnenus 1143-1180 (37)The death of Edward “The Confes-sor” indicates the beginning of Norman invasion. It is possible, that English chronicles mean here in reality “Roman invasion” because there is the parallel between some periods of Roman history and Norman history (see [1],[24])After the death of Manuel I the hard time for Byzantine empire began and the turning-point is the well-known crusade and the conquest of Constantinople in 1204. It is supposed today that Italian Rome organized the invasion in Byzantine empireThe commentary to the dynastic stream of English history. After the death of Edward “The Confessor” a new king Harold II “Godwinson” took the throne. He ruled only 1 year and was killed in 1066 in the battle near Hastings. From the other hand it is known ([7],p.343) that in reality he got a great political power in 1054 when Edward was alive. But the English chronicles placed just before the rule of Edward “The Confessor” one more “short” (i.e. with a short rule) Harold, namely Harold I “Harefoot” (1036-1039) who ruled only 3 years. It is possible that this Harold I is simply the reflection of Harold II
21. “Doubled Harold”, i.e. Harold I Danish (1036-1039) and then Harold II (1066 year). Harold II ruled only 9 months. It is clear that this “doubled Harold” is the reflection of Byzantine”doubled Isaac Angelus”, who ruled two times. His second rule was short: less than 1 year21. Isaac II Angelus 1185-1195, then he lost the power and appeared on Byzantine throne again in 1203 (second time). He ruled no more than 1 year and finally lost the power in 1204, after the conquest of Constanti- nople by crusaders. Thus, his second rule was no more than 1 yearNorman conquest of Anglia. The famous battle near Hastings in 1066The conquest of Byzantine empire by crusaders. Famous fourth crusade 1199-1204We will speak later and more detailed about the parallel between these events22. William I of Normandy (Bastard) The Conqueror 1066- -1087 (21). His rule starts the new Norman dynasty in Anglia22. Theodore I Lascaris 1204-1222 (18). In 1204 a new Nicaean empire starts on the territory of Byzantine empire. The reflection of Theodore in Byzantine empire-2 is Basil I the Macedonian 867-887 (19)23. William II “Rufus” 1087-1101 (14). Thus, here we have 14 years and in the right column we have 11 or 12 years. We see here some confusion in the chronicles because in the right column Isaac II Angelus ruled twice23. Possibly, there is some mess in the chronicles when they describe the Norman dynasty and Nicaean empire. The first conjecture: the original preimage for William II is lost. Second conjecture: this is again Isaac II Angelus. But in this case the chronicle took the whole his rule: 1185-1195 and then 1203- -1204, i.e. totally 11 or 12 years.24. Henry I 1101-1135 (34 or 35 years)24. John III Vatatzes 1222-1254 or 1256 (32). His reflection in Byzantine empire-2 is Leo VI “The Philosopher” 886-912 (26)25. Stephen of Blois 1135-1154 (19). King Stephen finishes the Norman dynasty in Anglia ([7],p. 357). The next king Henry II starts a new Anjou dynasty in Anglia25. Michael VIII 1259 or 1260 until 1282 or 1283 (23). His reflection in Byzantine empire-2 is Romanus I 919-945 (26). Michael VIII starts a new Palaeologus dynasty which lasts from 1261 until 1453
Thus the rigid chronological shift matches English Norman dynasty with Byzantine dynasty of Angelus and then matches the next Anjou dynasty with Byzantine dynasty of Palaeologus26. Henry II Plantagenet 1154-1189 (35). Note that both terms Plantagenet and Porphyrogenetus have the same meaning: “one who was born in a shirt”. This term has well- known meaning – see commentary below26. Andronicus II Palaeologus 1282 or 1283 – 1328 (46). If calculated from 1283 to 1320 – the moment when his co-ruler Andronicus III began to reign then duration of Andronicus II reign is 37 years. He was reflected as Constantine VII 910 or 912 – 959 (47),(49) in Byzantine empire-2.Commentary. Term (name) “Porphyrogenetus” = “Porphyro” + “Genitus” could be interpreted as “one, who was born in porphyr”. It says about birth in a “royal attributes”, maybe “royal clothes”, “royal shirt”. It suggests a rare case from medical practice when a baby is born “in a shirt”, i.e. still in placenta (placenta sounds similar to “planta” – part of “Plantagenet”). In old times such cases were considered as a sign of outstanding future for the baby (good or bad one). We see in English version (left column) a name Plantagenet, i.e. Planta + Genet. It means exactly “birth in a planta, in a cover” – the same as “birth in a shirt”27. Henry II established a known dynasty of Plantagenets (House of Plantagenet) in English history. This dynasty was finished in 1329 with Richard II. So, this dynasty covers time interval 1154-1399 ([27], p.346).27. Michael VIII. He was just before Andronicus II. He established a known dynasty of Palaeologus in the history of Byzantine. This dynasty covers time interval 1261-1453 (up to the siege of Constantinople) ([27], p.636).So, the chronological shift which we discovered puts together two dynasties: Palaeologus’ and Plantagenets. Dynasty of Palaeologus’ is finished in 1453 and reflecting them Plantagenets continue up to 1399. 28. Richard I Coeur de Lion 1189-1199 (10). Duration of his reign is 10 years which is close to 13 years – duration of reign of his analog (original) in Byzantine empire28. Andronicus III Palaeologus 1320-1328-1341. Formally his reign lasts 21 years (1320-1341), but his reign as unique emperor (without corulers) was only for 13 years (1328-1341). In 1328 finished the reign of his coruler – emperor Andronicus II.29.John Santer 1199-1216 (17)29. John VI Cantacuzenus 1341 or 1347 – 1355 (15)
30. Henry III 1216-1272 (56). Henry III was the last king in Anjou dynasty in England. Dynasty of Palaeologus in Byzantine empire (right column) is not finished at this point but it is near to the end30. John V Palaeologus 1341-1391 (50). His has a reflection in Byzantine empire-2: Basil II Bulgaroktonos (975 or 976 – 1025). Basil II Bulgaroktonos’ reign was for 49 or 50 years.31. Edward I 1272-1307 (35)31. Manuel II Palaeologus 1391-1425 (33 or 34).32. Edward II Caervarven 1307-1327 (20)32. John VIII Palaeologus 1424-1448 (23 or 24).End of parallelism.In 1453 Constantinople was seized by Turks and Byzantine Empire changed to Turkey.Fig.4 illustrates this parallelism. It is important that durations of reign fit each other so well in the case when the same chronological shift was applied to all reigns. All dynasty was shifted as a whole, it’s internal time was unchanged.Fig.5 shows the same parallelism in a different form which is designed for visual comparison of durations of reign in both dynasties. For quantitative comparison we used numerical characteristic of a distance between two arbitrary dynasties, which was introduced in [1],[24]. It appears that this “distance” drops into a range of values which are normal only for strongly dependent dynasties (details about this numerical characteristic one can find in [1],[24]). Recall that two dynasties are called as dependent ones if they both reflect the same real dynasty.Dependence of these two dynasties (we mean statistical dependence of reign durations) is the main result of this paper. It is in fact a formal result and we might finish on it. But many not formal questions follow after this result is claimed. Main of them is: what real events lay under both of these two dynasties? What was the real history?4. CORRECT ENGLISH HISTORY IS MORE SHORT IN TIME BUT MUCH MORE DENSE IN EVENTS THAN IT IS SUGGESTED BY TEXTBOOKS4.1. Our new concept of English historyThe answer follows definitely from the above parallelism and from the Fig.1. Naturally, the more new dynasty (one which was later in time) is to be supposed as original one. This is a Byzantine dynasty 1143-1453 A.D. It was denoted above as Byzantine empire-3. In [1],[24] it was discovered that Byzantine empire-3 is a source of information for it’s reflections Byzantine empire-0, Byzantine empire-1 and Byzantine empire-2. Roughly speaking the whole Byzantine history is constructed from several blocks – duplicates of the same epoch: 1143-1453 A.D. As we discovered, English history being stringed to the English kings dynasty is a duplicate of Byzantine history up to 1327 A.D. (in English chronology) = 1450 A.D. (in Byzantine chronology). Middle of 15th century was a time from which we have enough information, so Byzantine dynasty of that time was surely a real one. It suggests that Byzantine is an original in above parallelism, and England before 1327 A.D. – a reflection. It could be seen from the Fig.1 how English history before
1327 A.D. was constructed from several reflections of Byzantine Empire of 1143-1453 A.D.As a resume we present the follows hypothesis.1) According to English history of 1-400 A.D. England at that time was a Roman province. English history of that period speaks more about events in Rome itself then in England. It was proved in [1],[24] that Roman history of that time reflects real events from 9-13th cc. A.D.2) That chronicles which are supposed now to speak about English history of 400-830 A.D. appear to describe Rome and Byzantine empire-0. Therefore these chronicles reflect some real events of 9-15th cc. which took place in Byzantine empire.3) That chronicles which are supposed now to speak about English history of 830-1040 A.D. appear to describe Byzantine empire-1. These chronicles also reflect real history of 9-15th cc. in Byzantine empire.4) That chronicles which are supposed now to speak about English history of 1040-1327 A.D. appear to describe Byzantine empire-3 and therefore they reflect real history of 9-15th cc.in Byzantine empire. The name “Anglia” (England) came from the name of well-known Byzantine dynasty of Angels (1185-1204 A.D.)5) Thus, in this hypothesis we suggest that those ancient and medieval English chronicles which are now available and which are thought by historians to speak about some events from the epoch before the beginning of 14th century, are in fact devoted to certain periods of Byzantine history of 9-15th cc. Roughly speaking, ancient English chronicles are in fact Byzantine chronicles which were taken from Byzantine to England and then modified in a such way that they seem to speak about events in England.6) The time when written history of the island which is today called as England really begins is most probably the epoch of 9-10th centuries. Now we have only very few information about that early period of English history on the island. So the description of English history of 9-13 cc. is in fact rather fragmentary. But this information about real island events was then “covered” by chronicles brought from Byzantine empire. The resulting sum of two fibers: “island fiber” and “Byzantine fiber” we can see now as the English history of 9-13th cc.7) Starting from 14th century English history speaks about real events in England only. Roughly speaking, traditional version of English history becomes correct from 14th c.8) One might ask: “If you are right, how to explain the fact that in ancient English chronicles there are chronological details about, for example, how many years there were between the Flood and a certain event of English history? These chronological details often agree with Scaliger’s (modern) chronological concept.” The answer is follows.At first, note that chronological and astronomical data from ancient chronicles in many cases strongly contradict with modern historical version. See [1],[24].
In the second, even if we see that a direct chronological statement from ancient text agrees well with modern tradition, it says really nothing, because all ancient chronicles which we have today, were finally edited only in 15-17th cc. And it was exactly the time when modern chronological concept was worked out (in general). Such direct chronological statements are simply the traces of chronological computations of 15-17th cc. At that time historians “calculated” the dates of ancient events and then placed (for reader’s convenience) the results of their (medieval!) calculations inside ancient historical texts. The fact that chronological statements in different ancient texts often agree means that today we have mostly the results of work of only one medieval chronological school. It was the chronological school which work was supervised in 15-17th cc. by Roman-Catholic church.Often, astronomical calculations were used for chronological purposes. In this case there could be certain astrological motivations in medieval astronomical calculations for chronology. Medieval scientists, and historians among them, often trusted astrology and could use it in their considerations. Maybe medieval astrologers tried to solve problems like these: what was the planetary configuration at the moment of coronation of Justinian I (or when ancient lunar eclipses occurred etc.)? Results of such astronomical calculations of 15-16th cc. could be placed in ancient texts to make their chronology more clear. It was large work and it might be very useful if the calculations were correct. Unfortunately, medieval astronomers and historians made a lot of mistakes. These mistakes are discussed in [1],[24]. As a result of such mistakes, ancient chronicles got an incorrect chronological skeleton. This incorrect chronology was then supported by church authorities and by medieval scientific schools. It was the chronology which we have now in our textbooks. And today, our contemporaries – the historians and chronologists – take the ancient chronicles (from archives) and with pleasure discover in them the “astronomical and chronological information”. Then, basing on the modern theory, they date the described eclipses, horoscopes (i.e., the configuration of the planets along the zodiacal constellations). After this, historians discover (with great pleasure) that sometimes these records from “ancient chronicles” satisfy to the Scaliger’s chronology (and, consequently, are correct). Of course, sometimes there are some contradictions. And sometimes – very serious. The real explanation is as follows: the medieval methods for calculations were more rough that modern ones. Then in each such case the modern chronologists “correct” these “records of ancient chronicler”. As a result, they form the illusion of the correctness of traditional Scaliger’s version of ancient chronology. But what the modern historians really do when the results of modern astronomical calculations sharply disagree with Scaliger’s chronology? As we know today (see, for example, [1],[24]) the list of such contradictions is very long. This fact shows that Scaliger’s chronological version is wrong. But in all such cases the modern historians start to speak (with a great irritation and displeasure) about “ignorance of ancient observers and chroniclers”, about “impossibility to apply the modern scientific methods to the analysis an ancient texts” etc.The visual picture of our chronological conjecture you can see in the Fig.6.4.2. In which way the Byzantine chronicles were inserted into medieval English history (of the island Anglia)?The answer will be extremely simple if we will erase from our minds the picture which is imposed by traditional Scaliger’s chronology.Starting from 11th century, several crusades storm the Byzantine empire. Several feudal
crusaders’ states were founded on the territory of Byzantine empire in 11-14th cc. In these states many nations were mixed: local population, the crusaders from England, France, Germany, Italy etc. In these crusaders’ regions and in Byzantine empire the new culture was created, in particular, were written a historical chronicles. Among Byzantine inhabitants were a lot of people from Europe, in particular, from some island, which later will be called England.In 1453 A.D. Turks conquered Constantinople. Byzantine empire was ruined and the crowds of its inhabitants leaved the country. Many of them returned in the Europe, in their old homeland. In particular, – in the island Anglia. These descendants of crusaders took with them their Byzantine historical chronicle, because these texts describe their own real history in Byzantine empire (during many years – one or two hundreds years). Several decades passed. On the island Anglia starts the writing its history (i.e., the history of the people living on the island). In 16-17th centuries some qualified historians appear and start to create the general history of the whole land Anglia (“from the beginning”). They search for ancient documents. Suddenly they find several old trunks with “very old” documents. The documents are dusty, the paper is very fragile, and the old books fall to pieces. These chronicles were transported from Byzantine empire. But now (in 16-17th cc.) nobody knew this. Unfortunately, the prehistory of these trunks is forgotten. And, unfortunately, is forgotten that these chronicles describe the history of ANOTHER LAND. The English historians of 16-17th centuries carefully analyse these texts as the history “of island England” and put them into the basis of “old British-island history, which started many centuries ago”. In some strong sense they were right because really the authors of the chronicles were closely connected with island Anglia (but, let us repeat, described ANOTHER LAND – Byzantine empire).This process is quite natural and does not suggest any special falsification of the history. Such natural errors were inevitable at the first steps of creating of the general history.As a result, appeared such chronicles as Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, the Nennius’ chronicle etc. After some time this wrong version of an old English history stand stockstill, becomes a “monument”. Further historians simply modify (only a little) the initial scheme of the history, add some new documents. And only today, using some statistical and other methods we start to discover some strange regularities inside the “history textbook” and start to realize that the real history was possibly sufficiently shorter and that today we need to remove from the “old English history” its “Byzantine part” and return this piece to its right place (in time and in the geographical sense)This procedure is very painful. We realize this because we discovered the same problem in the old Russian history, when we also found several chronological duplicates.General remark. It is possible, that this process of “insertion of an old Byzantine chronicles” in the beginning of a “local history” is presented for several different regions which were closely connected with Byzantine empire. In particular, it is true for Russia, for England, for Rome, for Greece.5. OLD ENGLISH CHRONICLES AS ORIGINAL DOCUMENTS WHICH SPEAK ABOUT REAL EVENTS OF 10-13th CENTURIES5.1. Roman consul Brutus – the first who conquered Britain (and the first king of Britts)
We have analyzed above the durations of rules and suggested the conjecture that old English history is “a chronological reflection” of one period of real Byzantine history. The following question immediately arises: what about old English chronicles – do they confirm this conjecture? – or there are some contradictions? Let us take these chronicles and let us read them once more by “fresh sight”, without a priori “school” hypothesis about “great antiquity” of these sources.Now we recall to the reader well-known facts from traditional history of England (Anglia in old texts). Let us take, for example “Historia Brittonum” of Nennius, “Historia Britonum” of Galfridus Monemutensis and Anglo-Saxon Chronicle.Galfridus calls Brutus as FIRST king of Britts ([9],p.5). In brief, the story of conquest of Britain is as follows. After the end of the Trojan War and after the fall of Troy, the Trojan hero Aeneas arrived on the ship in Italy. After two or three generation his great-grandson Brutus was born ([9],p.6-7). By the way, Nennius thinks that “time distance” between Aeneas and Brutus is sufficiently more ([8],p.173). He states that “the distance” between Trojan war and Brutus is about several hundreds years. However, this difference is not so important for us.Then Brutus leaved Italy and arrived it Greece, where becomes the leader of Trojans survived after war. Brutus collects the large fleet and then his army (on the fleet) leaves Greece. After some time they landed on some “island”, began the battle with local people, won the war and founded the new kingdom.This is Britain.Brutus is the first in the row of rulers in ancient Britain. Today they are considered as legendary heroes, because, according to traditional chronology, these events were “in a deep past” (before Jesus Christ).Nennius tells the analogous story of Brutus (but more short). Nennius definitely states that Brutus “arrived on the island, which was called by HIS NAME, i.e., on the island Britain, then populated the island by his posterity and lived there. From this day and before now the Britain is populated” ([8],p.173). Thus, the Britain was called by the name of Brutus.Then Nennius informs us about opinion of some other authors, that “island Britain was called by the name of Britt, son of Isicion, who was the son of Alan” ([8],p.172). But according to the most widespread and authoritative version (which is quoted by Nennius) Britain was called “by the name of Brutus, who was ROMAN CONSUL (! – Auth.)” ([8],p.172). Thus, Brutus – the first king of Britain was Roman consul.This statement is extremely strange and impossible from the point of view traditional Scaliger’s chronology, because Rome was founded only about 753 B.C. and consequently in the epoch of this Brutus there are no “Roman consuls” and even no Rome! Anglo-Saxon Chronicle states that: “The first inhabitants of this land were the Britons, who came from ARMENIA (!-Authors)…” ([2],p.3).It is quite clear that here the name Armenia points out on the Romania, i.e. on the Roman-Byzantine empire, which was called Romai-Romania. Thus, as we see, the English chronicle again connects Britain and Roman-Byzantine empire.
Of course, today this statement of old chronicle is declared by historians as erroneous. The modern commentary is as follows: “instead of erroneous name Armenia one should read Armorica = Brittany” ([2],p.3). However, the replacement of Armenia by Armorica does not help to traditional history: the name Armorica also can be connected with the name of Roman-Byzantine empire. Our conclusion does not change.Thus, old English chronicles state that Britain was at first conquered by Roman consul Brutus, who arrived there with a military fleet and founded the British kingdom. He became the first king of an island Britain.5.2. Consul Brutus of English chronicles – was he a contemporary of Julius Caesar?It seems that the answer is quite clear. We need only to understand – when lived this remarkable Roman consul (according to traditional chronology)? It is very simple. The qualified reader already prompts to us the right answer: it was 1st century B.C. In this century we see (in modern textbook in ancient history) the well-known Roman consul Brutus – the friend and brother-in-arms of Julius Caesar. Brutus took part in many campaigns of Julius Caesar. Then Brutus betrayed Caesar – his patron and protector. We remember from our “scholar childhood” the bitter words of Caesar: “And you, Brutus”, which Caesar said when Brutus struck him by the sword.As we also known, the traitorous murder of Caesar – one of the most important episode in “biography” of ancient Roman consul Brutus. It is remarkable, but the old English chronicles also speak about this episode but in a slightly different words. They state that Brutus (the first Britts’ king) killed his farther. This murder is considered by chronicles as accidental, unintentional. Allegedly, Brutus shot an arrow and accidentally killed “his farther” ([8],p.173). In our opinion, this is slightly distorted Roman story about murder of Julius Caesar by Brutus. Here “farther” is Caesar – former friend and protector of Brutus.Because of this terrible murder, the people expel Brutus from his native land. It was done in both stories: in Roman and in English. Brutus started on a journey.Our simple and natural conjecture is as follows: in the old English story about conquest of Britain acts Brutus – the contemporary of Julius Caesar. As we saw, this conjecture is supported by ancient documents, although they do not call directly Brutus as friend or enemy of Caesar. Indeed, all chronicles state that AT FIRST Britain was conquered by Julius Caesar. Some interesting details are reported. Namely, Caesar arrived in Britain with Roman military fleet which consisted of about 80 ships ([2],p.5). But the conquest of the land became a complicated problem and soon Caesar returned in Britain with the fleet consisting of 600 (!) ships. After the battle the local army of natives were defeated and Romans founded the new kingdom. Moreover, Nennius claims that Julius Caesar WAS THE FIRST ROMAN who arrived on the island Britain and conquered the kingdom and Britts ([8],p.176).Thus, if Brutus WAS THE FIRST ROMAN arrived in Britain, and if Julius Caesar also WAS THE FIRST ROMAN arrived in Britain, then BRUTUS and JULIUS CAESAR are simply CONTEMPORARIES and brothers-in-arms. This conclusion evidently follows from old English chronicles.Let us resume these corollaries in the form of some table.
Brutus – the first king of BrittsJulius Caesar1. The first Roman arrived on the island, conquered the land and founded the kingdom1. The first Roman arrived on the island, conquered the country and also founded the kingdom2. Arrived in Britain with great military fleet2. Was the head of great military fleet which invaded into the land3. “Accidentally” killed his father by arrow3. His contemporary – Roman Brutus, Caesar’s friend, traitorously killed Caesar (= “his father-protector”)4. The murder of Brutus’ father by his son was predicted in advance by prophet (see Nennius, [8],p.173)4. Well-known story: the murder of Julius Caesar was predicted by Roman prophet (see, for example, Plutarch)5. Afterwards Brutus was expelled from his native land (as the men who committed the murder)5. Romans expelled Brutus as great traitor, because he killed Julius Caesar6. Roman consul Brutus starts the history of Britain6. Julius Caesar lived (according traditional chronology) in 1st c. B.C.Thus, from the position of common sense we immediately date the epoch of the first Brutus’ conquest of Britain (with his contemporary Julius Caesar) by 1st century A.D. Let us note, that this our statement is not new in reality. All experts know that Caesar conquered the Britain in 1st century A.D. All experts know that Brutus was the first who conquered Britain. We simply combine these two facts and formulate the evident conclusion:”Ancient” Roman consul Brutus – the “father” of all Britts, the first king of Britain, the “starting person” of the whole English history – is a contemporary on Julius Caesar, i.e., well-known in classical Roman history consul Brutus.The reader qualified in ancient history can, of course recall here also the second known Brutus in Roman history, who acted allegedly about 6th c.B.C. in Rome. He expelled the Roman kings from the capital and founded the Roman republic. But this historical epoch is in reality another chronological duplicate (copy), reflection of the epoch of Julius Caesar. It was discovered in [1],[24]. Consequently, the attempt to identify the Brutus = the first king of Britts – with “another Brutus” – fails. We again come to the epoch of Julius Caesar (1st century A.D. according to traditional chronology). Let us recall here, that according to chronological results, obtained in [1],[24], the epoch of Julius Caesar is in reality the duplicate (reflection) of the epoch of 10-11th cc.A.D.The reader can ask us: why we discuss in such details such evident question (the
identification of Brutus – the first king of Britts – with Brutus of Caesar’s epoch)?Our answer is as follows. This our statement is mortally dangerous to the traditional chronology of England (and not only England). This is the explanation why the traditional historians try to avoid any serious discussion about the assertion of English chronicles, that Brutus was Roman consul and that Britts are the descendants of Romans. In particular, the modern commentators of Nennius and Galfridus (A.S.Bobovich and M.A.Bobovich) irritatedly write: “The (medieval – Auth.) idea to deduce the origin of Britts from Romans and Trojans is not so original: already in 6th century A.D. the Frank’s rulers deduced their origin from Trojans (and, in our opinion, they were right, see the discussion about this subject in [1],[24] – Auth.)” ([9],p.270). And then commentators add carefully: “There are several Brutus in Roman history”. They do not continue and do not discuss this remark, and now we realize – why. If you start to analyse the “Brutus’ problem”, you (as we demonstrated above) will make the inevitable (and catastrophic for traditional chronology) conclusion that “English Brutus” was the contemporary of Julius Caesar.BUT WHY THIS CONCLUSION US SO DANGEROUS?At first, because in this case the so called “ancient legendary British history” is immediately moved upwards by approximately 1000-year shift in the epoch of 1-13th A.D. and moreover, in 10-15th cc.A.D.Such corollary, of course, is completely unacceptable (and totally fantastic) to any modern traditional historian. But there are some another, sufficiently more dangerous corollaries. About this – our next section5.3. Biblical events in English chroniclesThe “Historia Britonum” of Galfridus Monemutensis is strung on the pivot of biblical history. This means that sometimes, when speaking about the events of British history, Galfridus inserts the phrases similar to this: In Judea the prophet Samuel ruled at this time ([9],p.20). These rare phrases are scattered along the chronicle and form the rough (and very brief) skeleton of biblical history of prophets and biblical kings, which is closely interwoven with the stream of British history. But, by the way, Galfridus does not give any absolute dates. His chronology is completely relative, i.e., he tells only – in the time of which biblical kings (or prophets) were occurred some of British events. Thus, when analyzing the English chronology in a unprejudiced way, we meet the necessity to start the analysis of biblical chronology also. Let us do it and we will see what we will obtain.The evident identification of “English Brutus” with well-known Brutus from the epoch of Julius Caesar, is impossible for traditional historian because in this case the whole biblical chronology is automatically moved from its traditional place (in time) upwards by about at least 1000-year shift ! In reality this shift will be sufficiently more: about 1800 years! See [1],[24].Indeed, if “English Brutus” (the forefather of Britts) is placed in 1st century B.C., then, according to the “Historia Britonum” of Galfridus Monemutensis, ALL BASIC EVENTS OF BIBLICAL HISTORY should be distributed on time axis from 1st century A.D. until 13th century A.D. Here we mean: the history of all biblical prophets, the history of the kingdom of Judah and the kingdom of Israel et cetera. On the face of it, such conclusion is completely impossible! Traditionally, biblical history is dated from 11th century B.C.
until 1st century A.D.But if we will wait a little and will try nevertheless to place ancient biblical history on the interval from 1st century A.D. until 13th century A.D. – what we obtain?It turns out that this procedure does not lead to the contradiction with ancient evidences of ancient texts. We suggest to the reader to take the books of Fomenko [1],[24], where you can find the details. Here we demonstrate only one, but remarkable example.5.4. Do we interpret ancient texts in a proper way? Problem of vowels restoration.In the attempt to read and date the most of the ancient manuscripts (ancient Egyptian, ancient Slavonic, biblical et cetera) certain basic problems are frequently encountered.]As soon as J.Sunderland started investigating the original language of the Old Testament, he, in his words, “…faced the fact of enormous and even startling importance. The thing is that the Jewish written language originally had neither vowels nor signs replacing them. The books of the Old Testament were written only with consonants” ([16], p. 155).This is also typical for other languages. For example, an ancient Slavonic text was a chain of only consonants, too; sometimes even without signs replacing the vowels, or without division into words. Old Egyptian texts were also written in consonants only.According to well-known chronologist E.Bickerman, “…the names of Egyptian kings are given in contemporary literature schematically, in a quite arbitrary, so-called scholastic manner adopted in school textbooks. These forms are often greatly different from each other; it is impossible to order them somehow, due to their arbitrary reading (! – Authors.) which became traditional” ([17], p.176).Probably, the rarity and high cost of writing materials in ancient times made the scribes save them, and omit the vowels, thereby essentially shortening the text.J.Sunderland continues:”However, if we take the Jewish Bible or a manuscript today, we shall find in them the skeleton of vowels filled with dots and other signs denoting the missing vowels. These signs did not belong to the old Jewish Bible. The books were read by consonants, and the intervals were filled with vowels according to one’s skill and the apparent requirements of the context and oral legends” ([16], p. 155).Imagine how exact the meaning of a word written in consonants can be if, for example, CLN can mean clean, clan, colon, and so forth.According to T.Curtis, even for the priests, the content of manuscripts remained extremely doubtful and could be understood only by means of the authority of the legend ([16], p. 155).It is assumed that this serious short-coming of the Jewish Bible had been eliminated not earlier that the 7th or 8th century A.D., when the Massoretes revised the Bible and added
signs replacing the vowels; but they had no manuals, except their own reason, and a very imperfect legendary tradition ([16], p. 156-157).Well-known expert S.Driver adds that, since the times of the Massoretes in the 7th-8th century A.D., the Jews have taken to keeping their sacred books with extraordinary care, but then it was too late to repair the damage already done. The result of such attentiveness was just the immortalization of the distortions, which were then placed on exactly the same level of authority with the original text ([16], p.157).J.Sunderland: “The opinion reigning earlier was that the vowels had been introduced into the Jewish text by Ezra in the 5th century A.D. But in the 16th and 17th century, E.Levita and J.Capellus in France refuted this opinion and proved that th vowels had been introduced only by the Massoretes. The discovery created a sensation in the whole of Protestant Europe. Many people believed that the new theory would lead to disproving the religion completely. If the vowels were not a matter of Divine Revelation, but only a human invention, besides, a much later one, then how could we rely on the text of the Scripture? This discussion was one of the hottest in the history of the new biblical criticism and proceeded for more than a century, stopping only when the validity of the new point of view was acknowledged by everyone” ([16], p. 157-158).5.5. Geography and chronology of biblical events.5.5.1. Problems with traditional geographical localizations.Even if the vowels of common words are not that important (you can easily reconstruct a well-known word from the context), the situation changes completely when combination of consonants meaning a city, country, the name of a king, etc., appears in an ancient text. Tens and hundreds of different variants of vowels for one term (word) may be found, stating the “identifications” of the biblical vowel-free names of cities, countries, and others, made by traditional historians proceeding from the chronological (and geographical) version of J.Scaliger and the localization referring the biblical events to the Near East.As the archaeologist M.Burrows notes, the archaeological job generally leads to the undoubtedly strongest creed in the reliability of biblical information (cit.from [18], p. 16).F.Kenyon of the British Museum insists as much categorically on archaeology refuting the “destructive skepticism of the second half of the 19th century” [18].But here is unexpected information reported by the well-known archaeologist G.Wright, who, by the way, is a staunch partisan of the correctness of orthodox localization and of traditional dating biblical events. He wrote, “A great many findings do not prove or disprove anything; they fill the background and only serve as historical artifacts. Unfortunately, the desire “to prove” the Bible permeates many works available to the average reader. Historical evidences may be used in an incorrect manner, whereas the conclusions dawn are often erroneous and only half correct” ([18], p. 17).If we attentively examine the fundamental facts about the Bible discovered by N.A.Morozov [19], then we shall see that none of the books of the Old Testament contain any solid archaeological confirmation of their traditional geographical and time localization. As I.A.Kryvelev noted, the whole “Mesopotamian” biblical theory will be questioned.
The traditional localization of the events described in the New Testament is no better.I.A.Kryvelev many years studied the biblical geography and chronology. He wrote, “The reader interested in biblical archaeology may be bewildered by the hundreds of pages speaking of excavations, landscapes, or artifacts, historical and biblical background. And, in the conclusion, when it comes to the results of the whole job, there are only a number of indistinct and imprecise statements about the problem not having been completely solved, but that there is still hope for the future, and so forth. We may be absolutely sure that none of the stories of the New Testament contains any somewhat convincing archaeological confirmation (in terms of the traditional localizations – Authors). This is perfectly true, in particular, if applied to the figure and biography of Jesus Christ. Not a single spot traditionally regarded as the arena of a particular event occurring in the New Testament can be indicated with the slightest degree of confidence” ([18], p. 200-201).The natural question arises: where the events of Old and New Testaments were geographically located in reality?5.5.2. Where ancient Troy was located?In reality, considerable difficulties accompany the attempts of geographical localization of many of the ancient events and cities (not only from the Bible).For example, one of the accepted today traditional localizations of the famous city of Troy is near the Hellespont (= the sea of Helen). It is for this particular reason that Schliemann ascribed the famous name of Troy (described by Homer) to the rests of a small ancient village he excavated near the Hellespont. It is well known that today we have not any proofs of this “identification”.It is assumed today, that according to traditional chronology, Troy was completely destroyed in the 12-13th century B.C. and after this was never reconstructed [17]. But, it turns out, that in the Middle Ages, Italian city Troy, which still exists today [1],[24], enjoyed widespread fame. This is celebrated medieval city which played an important role in many medieval wars; especially, in the well-known war of the 13th century.Many Byzantine historians also speak of Homer’s Troy as of an existing medieval city, namely, Choniates Nicetas and Gregoras Nicephoras ([20], v. 6, p. 126).T.Livy indicates the spot named Troy and the Trojan region in Italy (Book.1). Certain medieval historians identified Troy with Jerusalem (see, for example, [21],p.88,235,162,207), which embarrasses the modern commentators: “The book of Homer somewhat suddenly turned (in the medieval chronicle, while describing Alexander’s expedition to Troy – Authors)… into the book on the destruction of Jerusalem” ([21], p. 162). Let us recall that the second (well-known) name of Troy is Ilion, whereas the second name of Jerusalem is Aelia Capitolina ([19], v. 7). It is absolutely clear that in the names of these cities there is a similarity: Aelia = Ilion.The books [1] and [2] contains the data and arguments which allow to assume that Homer’s Troy is the Constantinople (= New Rome), and that the Trojan War is the reflection of crusades which started from 11th c.A.D. The Constantinople was captured during crusades. Besides this, some part of the legend on Trojan War is the reflection of
a real medieval war from the middle of 13th c.A.D. in Italy. The Italian city Troy was involved in this war (see [1]).The identification of the Great Troy with Constantinople follows also from the texts of crusades epoch. The chronicler Rober de Clari told that the Great Troy was located near the entrance into the “branchium Sancti Georgii” ([25],p.210). It is supposed today that this is the Dardanelles. From the other hand it is also known that another famous chronicler of the 4th crusade – Villehardouin – calls as “branchium Sancti Georgii” not only the Dardanelles but also the Bosporus! M.A.Zaborov (modern historian) notes: “Villehardouin applies the name “branchium Sancti Georgii” to the Dardanelles and to the Bosporus” ([25],p.238).Thus, the Great Troy can located also near the entrance into the Bosporus. But here we see the Constantinople!Consequently, it was completely unnecessary to search the “rests” of the Troy on a desert hills as Schliemann done. Our conjecture: the Trojan War is the reflection of the one or several crusades on the Constantinople or on Italian Troy.The well-known medieval “Novel on the Troy” of Benoit de Sainte-Maure (“Roman de Troie”) was finished allegedly between 1155 and 1160 A.D. “The source of this novel is the “History of Troy destruction” written by some Dares, who was allegedly the eyewitness of Trojan War (possibly, he was one of the crusaders – Auth.). Benoit looks in the antiquity through the prism of his epoch and his reality… In his basis is the ancient Greek epos, but its personages and heroes are transformed into noble knights and beautiful ladies, and the Trojan War itself is transformed into the sequence of knight’s duels… Ancient Medea is represented in his chronicle as courtier lady, whose clothing is exactly the same as the clothing of the lady of her social level in medieval France of the middle of 12th century”([10],p.235).We suggest to read the old chronicles “in direct way”, without some special complex interpretations; we need to read “what is written” and not “what should be written”. In this case we are forced to agree that Benoit de Sainte-Maure describes the Trojan War as the event from medieval epoch.5.5.3. Where Moses traveled in reality?Let us return to the Bible. Many strange phenomena occur in an unprejudiced analysis of biblical geography (see detailed Morozov’s analysis in [19]).That many biblical texts describe volcanic activity has been stressed in history long ago. Let us take the Bible.The Lord said to Moses, “I am now coming to you in a thick cloud… But when the ram’s horn sounds (when the cloud leaves Mount Sinai – Authors), they may go up the mountain’… there were peals of thunder and flashes of lightning, a dense cloud on the mountain and a loud trumpet blast… Mount Sinai was all smoking because the Lord had come down upon it in fire; the smoke went up like the smoke of a kiln… and the sound of the trumpet grew ever louder” (Ex. 19:9, 13, 16, 18).And then: All the people saw how it thundered and the lightning flashed, when they heard
the trumpet sound and saw the mountain smoking…” (Ex.20:18).”You stood… at Horeb… THe mountain was ablaze with fire to the very skies: there was darkness, cloud, and thick mist. And the Lord spoke unto you out of the midst of the fire ” (Dt. 4:10-12).The destruction of biblical cities Sodom and Gomorrah has long been regarded in history to have been due to a volcanic eruption. For example:”And then the Lord rained down fire and brimstone from the skies on Sodom and Gomorrah… He saw thick smoke rising high from the earth like the smoke of a like-kiln” (Gn.19:24,28). And so on.The complete list of all apparent volcanic eruptions mentioned in the Bible was compiled by V.P.Fomenko and T.G.Fomenko (see [1],[24]).To associate (as is done traditionally) all these descriptions with Mn. Sinai = Mn. Horeb (and Jerusalem in traditional Palestine) seems doubtful; it is generally known that it has never been a volcano.Where did the events occur then?It suffices to study the geological map of the Mediterranean area to obtain immediately the unique answer. There are no acting volcanoes in the Sinai peninsula, Syria, or Palestine; there are only zones of tertiary and quaternary volcanism, as, for example, near Paris. In the above-mentioned regions, where the biblical events are traditionally located, no volcanic activity has been discovered in historical epoch since the birth of Christ. Besides, Egypt and North Africa have no volcanoes. The only powerful, and by the way, acting volcanic zone, is Italy together with Sicily.Thus, according to the Bible, we have to find1) a powerful volcano active in the historical era; 2) a destroyed capital (see the book of the Prophet Jeremiah) near the volcano; 3) two other cities destroyed by the volcano, namely, Sodom and Gomorrah.There exists such a volcano in the Mediterranean, and it is unique, namely the famous Vesuvius, one of the most powerful volcanoes in history.Famed Pompeii (biblical “capital”?) and two destroyed cities Stabiae (Sodom?) and Herculaneum (Gomorrah?) are located nearby. We cannot but mention a certain similarity in the names of these Italian and biblical towns. It is possible that the name of Sinai for Vesuvius originates from the Latin Sino (sinus), and biblical Horeb from the Latin horribilis (horrible).The following analytic study worth mentioning, which permits to read the vowel-free text of the Bible, was performed by Morozov in [19]. It took into account placing Mt.Sinai=Horeb=Sion in Italy.We illustrate by several examples.
The Bible speaks: “The Lord our God spoke to us at Horeb and said, “You have stayed on this mountain long enough; go now, make for all KNN (Canaan)…” (Dt.1:6-7).The theologians supply the Hebrew KNN with vowels Canaan and place it in the desert on the Dead Sea coast, but another solution is also possible, namely, KNN = GENUA (Italian Genoa).The Bible continues: “All KNN (Canaan) and the LBN (Lebanon)…” (Dt. 1:7). The theologians restore the Hebrew LBN with vowels as Lebanon; however lebanon means “white”, i.e., the same as Mont Blanc, or White Mountain. Famous mountain in Europe. “As far as the great river, the PRT” (Dt. 1:7). The theologians restore PRT with vowels and decipher is as Euphrates; but, there is the large tributary of the Danube, the Prut, located in central Europe, as beyond Mont Blanc. “Then we set out from Horeb… and marched through that vast and terrible wilderness” (Dt. 1:19).In fact, the famous Phlegraei, vast and burnt-out spaces filled with small volcanoes, fumaroles, and solidified lava streams are located near Vesuvius=Horeb. “And so we came to KDS-BRN” (Dt. 1:19).KDS-BRN is traditionally supplied with vowels as Kadesh-Barnea, which is, from the other hand, possibly, a town on the Rhone ([19], v. 2, p. 166). It is also possible that modern Geneva was meant as “town on the Rhone”. “And we spent many days marching round the hill-country of Seir” (Dt. 2:1).Mount Seir was left here without translation; however, if it is translated, we obtain Devil’s Mountain(s). And there is such a mountain near Lake Geneva, namely Le Diableret (“Devil’s Mountain”).Then, the “Children of Lot” (Dt. 2:9) met on the way can be evidently identified with the Latins ( = LT).”And cross the gorge of the Arnon” (Dt. 2:24). In the canonical translation we see Arnon (RNN). But,this is the Italian river Arno existing up to now!”Next we… advances… to Bashan” (Dt. 3:1). The town Bashan (Bassan) is often mentioned in the Bible. It is surprising that town Bassano still exists in Lombardy.”King of Bashan… came out against us at Edrei” (Dt.3:1). Adria is still here, on the Po delta; the Po, by the way, has often been mentioned by ancient Latin authors (e.g., Procopius) and called the Jordan (in Procopius’ Eridanus), which is very consistent with the biblical spelling of the Jordan, namely hay-yarden (JRDN) ([19], v. 2, p. 167).”And we captured all his cities… sixty cities…”(Dt. 3:3-4).Indeed, in the Middle Ages, there were many big cities in the region: Verona, Padua, Ferrara, Bologna, and others.”From the gorge of the Arnon to Mount Hermon (HRMN)” (Dt. 3:8).
But it is obvious that MNT HRMN can be supplied with vowels to be translated as the “German mountains”. “Only the Og king of Bashan remained… His sarcophagus of iron may still be seen in the… city of Rabbah” (Dt. 3:11).Here is mentioned not only Ravenna (=Rabbah), but also the famous tomb of Theodoric (493-526 A.D.) of the Ostrogoths (Og = Goths?). It is clear that biblical OG means possible GOTH.There follows TBRN (Taberiah in traditional biblical translation), which is naturally identified with the Tiber in Italy; ZN is Siena, southeast of Livorno. The slopes of Monte Viso are called Jebus (Jgs. 19:10-11) in the Bible, and Rome is called Ramah (Jgs. 19:14).And so on. As we see, the shift of some biblical events from “the deep antiquity” in the medieval epoch does not contradict with the ancient text of the Bible (without vowels). Thus, now we can continue our analysis of English history.5.6. Why English chronicles suggested that both Russia and England were located on islands? The fact that modern England is located on the island, does not surprise us. But Russia!? There are no geographical reasons to think that Russia is the island! But nevertheless, for example the well-known chronicler Benoit de Sainte-Maure in his “Chronicle of the dukes of Normandy” [22] speaks, thatThere exists an ISLAND called Cansie (or Canzie), and I think that this is Rosie (in another copy of the manuscript – Russie – Auth.), which is surrounded by the great salty sea. And they (the people of Russie – Auth.) fly out as great swarm of bees, and their number is thousands; and they… can attack the great kingdoms and take the great procurement and they can win and conquer.Here the original text: “Une isle i a par non Cancie (Canzie in manuscript B – see [10],p.240), e si crei bien que c’est Rosie (Russie in manuscript B, see [10],p.240), qui est de la grant mer salee de totes parz avironnee. Dunc autresi com les euetes de lor diverses maisonnetes gitent essains granz e pleners, ou moct a nombres e millers, ou com de ceus qui sunt irie’ sunt en estor glaive sachie’, tost e isnel d’ire esbrasez, trestot eissi e plus assez seuct icil poples fors eissir por les granz rennes envair e por faire les granz ocises, les granz gaaiz e les conquises.”Russia is called here Rosie or Russie. If we look in the table of medieval names, titles and their duplicates (see above), we will see that here the chronicler really speaks about Russia. V.I.Matuzova (who included this text in her book “English Medieval Texts”) comments this fragment as follows:”Rosie is Russia. The report that Russia is an ISLAND is similar to another such reports…”([10],p.244). And then Matuzova quotes another medieval authors who were confident that Russia is an ISLAND (in particular, some Arabian and Persian chroniclers; but, by the way, it is not so clear – where they lived in reality, may be in Spain?).It is supposed sometimes today that Cancie is Scandinavia. But Scandinavia also is not an island! By the way, the “Chronicle of Monastery of Saint Edmund” (13th c. A.D.) is
also convinced that Russia is located on an island, because reports that Tartars rushed on Hungary FROM ISLANDS ([30], and also [10],p.100-101).How we can explain it? The simplest way – to accuse the authors of 12th century that they were completely ignorant (this is the standard explanation in modern historical textbooks and this idea allows to the modern historians simply to “close the problem”).But another explanation is also possible. English word island means today the piece of land surrounded by a sea. But may be in the medieval epoch this word had also another meaning? Our conjecture: it was Asia-Land, i.e., the Land located in Asia. Without vowels we have: asialand = SLND, and island = SLND. This is the same word!Then all things immediately fit in their “correct places”. Russia really can be considered (from the Western point of view) as far Asian Land = island. Large part of Russia belongs to the Asia. Consequently, medieval chroniclers were quite right when we talked about Island Russia. They were not so ignorant as it is supposed today.Let us repeat once more our conjecture: the word island had two meanings in the past: piece of land surrounded by a sea, and Asia-Land.But in this case the natural question arises (as the flash). If the ancient English authors speaking about island Russia, assumed that they speak about Asia-Land Russia, then we do not see any obstacles to assume that when they told bout island Anglia, they also speak about Asia-Land Anglia. And only after this, in a new epoch, the word island Anglia become to be considered only as island Anglia in a modern sense (piece of land surrounded by sea).We saw the remarkable parallel between English history and Byzantine history. But Byzantine Empire really was Asia-Land for Western chroniclers. And only in the next epoch (when Byzantine chronicles were transported in England and were inserted into English history) the Asia-Land Anglia was transformed into Island Anglia.Thus, were was located the land Anglia-Britain in 10-12th cc. A.D.? This is a complicated question. To get the answer we have unique way – to take the old English chronicles. Our answer will be as follows:Anglia-Britain of 10-12th cc.A.D. was Byzantine Empire.5.7. Where was the land Britain which was conquered by Brutus located? In what direction his fleet cruised?On the face of it, the answer on this absurd question is completely evident: on the same place where England-Britain is located today. But let us not hurry.Let us recall after “accidental murder of his father”, Brutus was expelled from Italy. He went to the Greece ([9],p.7). Here Brutus fixed the ancient relationship and he was staying among Trojans ([9],p.7). The period of wars in Greece started at this time. These wars are described by Galfridus in many details. Then Brutus organized the army and fleet and after this started the campaign-cruise. It is supposed today that his fleet went in Atlantic ocean and then arrived in modern England. Is it true? Maybe the chronicles
describe in reality the military operations inside Mediterranean sea and on the territory of Greece and Byzantine Empire?For example, Brutus’ army arrived in Sparatin. Modern commentary: “Location is unknown” ([9],p.230). Of course, you cannot find Sparatin if you assume that Brutus travel far from Mediterranean sea. But if these events occurred in Greece, then you do not need to search Sparatin, because this is well-known Sparta.Then Galfridus describes the path of Brutus’ fleet which is considered today as a “proof” that Brutus really went in Atlantic and then arrived in modern England. But we see suddenly from modern comments that it turns out that Galfridus “repeat the mistake containing in his source – namely, in “Historia Brittonum” of Nennius, who made the mistake because of erroneous reading of Orosius’ chronicle…”([9],p.231). Moreover, then it turns out that “following to Nennius, Galfridus ERRONEOUSLY placed Tyrrhenian Sea BEHIND Gibraltar. We recall that Tyrrhenian Sea is BEFORE Gibraltar because is a part of Mediterranean Sea near Western coast of Italy” ([9],p.231).But we are sure that here – no mistake! Galfridus was right because he describes in reality some complicated military movements INSIDE Mediterranean Sea, in particular, near Italy, where you can see Tyrrhenian Sea. Brutus’ fleet did not pass in the Atlantic Ocean! Modern historians try to accuse Galfridus (and other chroniclers) in some “mistakes” only because historians try to adjust their modern “traditional” chronological and geographical concepts with real evidences of real medieval texts. Of course, a lot of contradictions appear. All these contradictions are considered today as “the fault of medieval authors”.Then Galfridus describes the battle between Brutus’ army and Greeks on the Akalon (Acalon) river ([9],p.8). The modern commentary is as follows: “This name is, possibly, the fantasy of Galfridus… E.Pharal is his book formulated the idea that this description of Greek’s defeat during the battle with Trojans near Acalon river, was taken by Galfridus from the story of Etien de Blua about the defeat of TURKS during the battle with CRUSADERS near “Moscolo” river at March 1098 A.D.” ([9],p.230).Consequently, here we can penetrate through the thick cover of traditional plaster into the real contents of the Galfridus chronicle. He describes in reality (following to some old documents) the epoch of the First Crusade in the end of 11th c.A.D. in Byzantine Empire.Thus, we can assume that Brutus’ campaign = Julius Caesar’s campaign is the reflection of well-known crusade in the end of 11th c.A.D. The conquest of Britain is shifted from the 1st c.B.C. into the 11th c.A.D. (about 1000-year shift !). This fact confirms the discovered parallel (“identification”) between Roman-Byzantine history of 10-15th cc.A.D. and old English history starting, allegedly, in 1st c.B.C. See above.After some time they (Brutus’ fleet) arrived to “the island which was called Albion” ([9],p.17). Modern commentary: Albion = Al’bania – one of the early (old) names of Britain or the part of it, which was appeared in ancient sources” ([9],p.232).When speaking about Britain, Galfridus very often uses its second equivalent name: Al’bania ([9],p.19).Thus, Britain = Al’bania.
Let us refuse now to follow the traditional historical version which identifies persistently the Anglia of 10-12th cc. A.D. with the modern island. Then we immediately recognize the modern name Albania (located on the territory of medieval Byzantine Empire) in this Galfridus’ term Al’bania.Thus, Galfridus places the medieval Britain on the territory of medieval Byzantine Empire.The name Albania or Al’bania was slightly transformed into Albion later (occasionally or, possible, deliberately), when somebody decided to erase the evident traces of Byzantine origin of the old English chronicles.5.8. With whom Brutus fights while conquering of Britain = Albania? After landing on the coast of Albania (later Albion), “Brutus named the island Britain using his own name, and named his fellows Britts” ([9],p.17). By the way, transformation of the Asia-Land Albania into island Albion (as a piece of land surrounded by sea) can be supported and partially explained because of the reason that Brutus arrived into Albania with his fleet, i.e., after sea expedition. And in some texts the landing on the coast of Byzantine Empire was transformed into the landing on the coast of some island.With whom meets Brutus after landing?With giants. We think that here chronicle means different great nations which lived in Byzantine Empire and possibly formed some individual dependent or independent states.]”Among these giants was one especially disgusting, abominable, who was called Goemagog” ([9],p.17-18). This “giant” was (according to Galfridus) extremely powerful and terrible. Brutus’ army meets in battle with 12 giants (among them – Goemagog). Initially, Britts were defeated. But then they “won and killed all the giants except of Goemagog” ([9],p.18). The battle with Goemagog continues and in the end Britts won.Let us stop for a moment and think a little. What tells us Galfridus in his poetic chronicle (of course, he was based on some old real documents).1) About the victory of Britts. In other words, as we think, – about the victory of crusaders who conquered Byzantine Empire.2) About one of the most dangerous their enemies – some Goemagog.The modern commentary:”Galfridus combined in one name two ones: Gog and Magog” ([9],p.232). The modern historian, the commentator of Galfridus chronicle, noted that the nations Gog and Magog are frequently mentioned in the Bible (in Revelation, in Ezekiel). For example, in the biblical book Ezekiel we can see the following text about these terrible and powerful nations:”Set thy face against Gog, the land of Magog, the chief prince of Rosh, Meshech and Tubal…Gog shall come against the land of Israel…” (Ezekiel, 38:2-3,18). According to the
Bible, death and destruction carry these nations.Remark. In some English publications of the Bible the word “Rosh” is omitted! Why?About the hordes of Gog and Magog with fear speaks the biblical book of Revelation: “Satan shall be loosed out of his prison, and shall go out to deceive the nations… Gog and Magog, to gather them together to battle: the number of whom is as the sand of the sea” (Revelation, 20:7-8).The modern historian tells us: “Late the people fantasy transformed Gog and Magog into spiteful, malicious giants. In London starting from the Middle Ages there are two monuments – the figures of Gog and Magog (near entrance to the City, today near town hall” ([9],p.232).These two medieval nations are well-known and are identified according to some medieval chroniclers with Goths and Mongols. In 13th c.A.D. Hungarians considered Gog and Magog as Tartars ([9],p.174). All these facts forced us to move the events described by Galfridus into Byzantine Empire (or in neighboring countries).From the other hand it is impossible do not mention about the following important remark.The Moscow kingdom, according to the old Russian legend, which can be found in Russian textbooks until 19th century, “was founded by biblical patriarch Mosoh”. This legend explains why Moscow is called in Greek as Mosha (Moska). When the Moscow kingdom was founded? The reader gives the answer immediately: the first note in chronicles about Moscow is dated by 1147 A.D.Because the Bible speaks about Gog, the chief prince of Meshech and Tubal, N.A.Morozov formulated an interesting question:”Is it true that the Russian MUZHIK (man, fellow) = Rosh-Meshech was reflected in this famous biblical fragment, as the founder of Russia-Muzhikovii ? Then, after the filtration of the sound ZH through the Greek language, where this sound is transformed into S, this word was returned again into Russia as “Russia-Moscow”.’ ([19],vol.2,p.579).Morozov wrote: “Any kind of interpretation for these fragment from the Bible leads you to the historical epoch of Mongolian period in Russian history, i.e., to the epoch starting from 1227, when Mongol Batu (Batyi) becomes the ruler (king) of Moscow. When we agree with this point of view, then all things become very natural…” ([19],vol.2,p.615).We realize that for the reader who is not acquainted with the history of chronological problems and with the books of Morozov [19], Fomenko [1],[24] and Fomenko, Kalashnikov, Nosovskij [3], some of our ideas sound sometimes strange. Nevertheless, from the other hand, as can see the reader, all these ideas are produces by the formal logical analysis of the old English chronicles.Thus, if we return to the Galfridus chronicle, we are forced to formulate the corollary: during the landing on the coast of Byzantine Empire in 11th c.A.D. the Brutus’ army meets with several large nations, and among them are Goths, Mongols and Russians. It is quite natural for 11th c.A.D. because of an important role which play these nations at
this time in medieval Europe and Asia.5.9. With whom Julius Caesar fights while conquering of Britain = Albania?Let us remind that the Brutus’ epoch is simultaneously the Julius Caesar’s epoch. If so, the military operations of Brutus should be reflected in the texts speaking about the same operations but from the Caesar’s camp.Galfridus, when finishing the Brutus’ story, and passing several centuries along time-axis, comes finally to Caesar’s epoch. Then he started to repeat the same “Brutus’ story”, but, of course, from different point of view.Galfridus: “As it was mentioned in Roman history, Julius Caesar (after victory in Gallia) appeared on the coast of Rutheni. Looking from there on the island Britain, he asked his fellows, – what about this country and which nation lives here” ([9],p.37).It is quite clear to the trained reader that, according to the opinion of modern historians, Galfridus again demonstrates here his medieval ignorance. The modern commentary to this fragment of Galfridus’ text is as follows: “Rutheni are the Gall nation lived in Aquitaine (southern-western Gallia). It is impossible “to view” Britain from there, and consequently, Rutheni appeared in Galfridus text erroneously” ([9],p.238).Who are Rutheni? The reader can take again the dictionary of medieval names and their duplicates (see Matuzova [10]) and he will obtain the answer immediately:Rutheni are Russians.Really:ANCIENT RUSSIAN STATE: Susie, Russie, Ruissie,Rusia, Russia, RUTHENIA, RUTENEA, Ruthia, RUTHENA, Ruscia, Russcia, Russya, Rosie.RISSIANS: Russii, Dogi (!), Rugi (!), RUTHENI (!), Rusceni.It is well-known that Russian army several times took part in the military operations on Byzantine territory, in particular, they attacked the Constantinople. Thus, in the Middle Ages Russian forces really occupied some Byzantine regions. And it was quite possible “to view” the Albania = Britain = Byzantine Empire from there.Thus, our conjecture is as follows. Rutheni mentioned in old English chronicles during the Julius Caesar’s conquest of Albania = Britain – are the Russians of 10-12th cc.A.D.Later these Rutheni were shifted along the geographical map in Western direction, when the old English chronicles were taken from Byzantine Empire into modern island England. As a result of such artificial displacement (shift) the name Rutheni appeared on the map of Gallia (in France). Consequently, real Rutheni were “doubled, duplicated”. Then the initial, original location of real Rutheni was forgotten among the English chroniclers. Let us note the important idea.
When the Byzantine chronicles were transported from the East to the West (and were inserted in the history of modern island Britain), this shift also generated the “geographical shift” of many names and titles which were initially located in Byzantine Empire and around it. Rutheni (= Russians) are only one of these examples. We will demonstrate below some another examples.Let us return to Julius Caesar in Galfridus’ description. The fleet of Caesar invades into Albania = Britain. Here he starts the battle with Britts ([9],p.38), then defeats them and conquest the country. Let us stop for a moment and ask the question: who are Britts in 10-12th cc.A.D.? Traditional explanation is as follows: Britts are the descendants of Brutus. This “explanation” explains nothing. Basing on our experience, we can suspect that “Britts” of 10-12th cc.A.D. is some real nation of Middle Ages living in some part of Byzantine Empire. We do not need to search too long. The answer is on the surface.An important part of Roman-Byzantine Empire is Romania = Rumania, and also Bulgaria. Here you can see the well-known river Danube with large afflux Prut = PRT (without vowels) or = BRT. In the epoch of crusades the Byzantine Empire was the collection of several feudal states. One of the important nations, which were represented here (as crusaders), were Germans and Prussians. Let us put the question: which name was used by medieval English chroniclers for Prussians? The immediate answer is given by the same dictionary by Matuzova [10]:PRUSSIA: Prurenia (!), (P-Rutenia = P-Russia),PRUSSI (Prussians): Prateni, Pruteni, Pructeni, Prusceni, Praceni, Pruceni.Thus, the medieval sources call the Prussians as Pruteni = PRTN. It is possible that here we see the medieval BRT = Britts = Brits, described by Galfridus. Thus, it is possible that Julius Caesar was at war with medieval Prussians = Pruteni. In particular, Britain = BRTN (in 10-12th cc.A.D.) coincides with RRTN = Pruneti = Prussia ! Thus, one of the large regions in Byzantine Empire, namely, – occupied by Prussians = Pruteni, – gave the name for Britain = Prutenia.But another answer is also possible.According to the Abglo-Saxon Chronicle, the British language is the language Welsh ([2],p.3). But Welsh is evidently Vlachi = Blachi and, according to the Matuzova’s dictionary, denotes the Thurki = Turci = Turks. If so, in some cases the Britts can be identified with Turks (at least in some medieval chronicles). But this identification again leads us to the Byzantine Empire as the location of early English history.We hope that we gave the reasonable answer of the natural question:With whom Julius Caesar fights while conquering of Britain = Albania?5.10. Where was London located in 10-11th cc. A.D.? Trained reader waits with answer because suspects (and it is reasonable) that correct answer can be completely unexpected.
And we continue to read the old English chronicles which give us the correct answers on the all such questions. But we need to read “what is written” and not “what should be written”. The second formula is sometimes the point of view of modern historical Scaliger’s tradition which is in the basis of a modern textbook on ancient history.Galfridus:”When finishing with the division of the kingdom, Brutus decided to built a new town-capital… He founded the town and called it NEW TROY (! – Auth.). The town preserved this name during many years and then, because of distortion the initial title, the name was transformed into TRINOVANT. After this, Lud… who fighted with Julius Caesar,… ordered to call the town CAERLUD which means “Town of Lud” (the word Caer = Cair means simply “town”, see details below – Auth.). It was the cause of a great conflict between Lud and his brother Nennius, because Nennius was not agree with Lud who wanted to forget the initial name TROY” ([9],p.18).And then: “The title was distorted and was transformed into Caerludein, then into Lundene and finally, into Lundres” ([9],p.37).The modern commentary: “Trinovant is today the city London” ([9],p.232).Thus, the old English chronicles states that:New Troy = Trinovant = Lud = Lundene = London.Here we recall that according to the analysis in [1],[24], the NEW TROY of 10-11th cc.A.D. is New Rome = Constantinople. As we have mentioned above, the most known historical version states that “the Troy of Homer” is “somewhere near” the Constantinople = Istanbul. Schliemann wrongly spent a lot of his time for senseless “excavations of the Troy” (he discovered not the Troy). It was sufficient simply to point out on the Constantinople = future Istanbul.This idea is in a nice correspondence with all previous results which give the Byzantine location for initial old events of English history.Thus, Galfridus possibly tells us about the 1st crusade of 1099 A.D. As the result of crusade, the new capital was founded – NEW TROY = future Constantinople.Let us attract the attention of the reader to the following remarkable fact. There exists a well-known town TYRNOVO in Bulgaria. But this name is similar to the name TRINOVANT and means simply TROY NEW, i.e., TROY NEW = TyrNovo. It becomes clear that the name Trinovant was initially appeared in Byzantine Empire, on the Balkan Peninsula, in the Slavonic region and its initial meaning was NEW TROY. In English the word new means the same as Slavonic nova or new. Thus, one the initial names of LONDON was TROY NEW (its trace is Tyrnovo in Bulgaria). It is interesting that Galfridus states the same, when he tells us about transformation of the name NEW TROY into TRINOVANT. In reality, this is not a transformation, but simply the transposition of two words: Troy and New inside the joint title.It is clear also, that “town Lud” means simply “town LD” or “town LT”, i.e. = “town of Latins” = “Latin town”. The appearance of the name LT in old English chronicles is quite natural: in the epoch of crusades in 1204 A.D. the new LATIN EMPIRE was appeared on
the territory of Byzantine Empire. Latin Empire gave its name to the capital: LATIN TOWN, i.e. Caer-Lud (Cair-Lud). Nennius tells us that word “Cair” means in old Britts’ language “Town” ([8],p.190).Identification of New Troy = London with Constantinople follows also from the following fact. As we saw, New Troy was called later Cair-Lud or Caer-Lud. But Caer or CR (without vowels) sounds also, for example in Slav languages, as ZR because of often oscillation between C and Z. Thus, CR or ZR is evidently ZAR (czar = zar which means “king”, “ruler”). Slavonic name for Constantinople was ZAR-GRAD, which means “king-town”. Thus, CAER-LUD = ZAR-LUD, i.e. “king-town of Latins” (Latin king town). This is exactly Constantinople = ZAR-GRAD in Slav language.Trained reader expects that the whole this story of Galfridus (about origin of London’s name) the modern historical science claims as wrong and erroneous:The Galfridus’ information about the history and origin of the name London (from the name of Lud) is wrong. The antique authors (Tacitus, Ammian Marcellinus) call this town Londinium or Lundinium. The real history of the name of London is disputable” ([9],p.237).Thus, after the 1st crusade in 1099 A.D. some chronicles called the New Rome as NEW TROY. Then, after the foundation in 1204 A.D. the Latin Empire the capital was called also (or was renamed?) LATIN TOWN, i.e., Caer-Lud and finally, LONDON. This name was then transported into island England when some of Byzantine chronicles were moved in this direction (after the fall of Constantinople in 1204 A.D. or 1453 A.D.).Nennius listed in his chronicle “the names of all towns which exist in Britain, and their number is 28″ ([8],p.190). The modern commentary: “Cair means Town in Britts’ language” ([8],p.283). We can note here that the capital of Egypt is Cairo. Consequently, we see again, that in Britts’ language the clear “Eastern trace” was remained. May be, this fact indicates the Eastern origin of initial old English history.Galfridus tells us that New Troy ( = London) was founded on the Thames river ([9],p.18). We think that initially “Thames river” was one of the name for the Bosporus, where Constantinople is located. The Bosporus sound (strait) is really very long, sufficiently thin, and was represented on the old geographical maps as large river. Schliemann, by the way, decided to place “his Troy” also in this region, namely – in the end of another long and thin strait (sound) – the Dardanelles, which is close to the Bosporus.Today the name of the “London river” is Thames. But because all these events are happened in the East, we need to remember that here some people read the text in opposite direction: from the right to the left (in Europe: from the left to the right). The word SOUND (= strait) without vowels is SND and after opposite reading is DNS. Because D and T were sometimes equivalent, and the same is valid to M and N, we see that the following conjecture (equivalence) is possible: DNS = TMS, i.e. “sound” = “Thames”.From the other hand, Thames is practically identical with Themis. But Themis is the name of well-known GREEK goddess of justice.5.11. Who were scots in 10-12 cc.A.D. and were did they live? Where was Scotland located in 10-12 cc.A.D.?
Scotland = Scot + Land = the Land of Scots. Scots live in Scotland – this is well-known fact. But sufficiently less is known that in old English chronicles the Scots sometimes are called Scithi, i.e., Scyths ! See, for example the manuscript F of Anglo-Saxon Chronicle ([2],p.3, comment 4). Thus, one of possible answers on the question in the title of present section is as follows: Scots = Scyths. In other words, Scotland = the Land of Scyths = Scithi-Land. Scyths lived in Scythia, which is partially identified with some regions in modern Russia. Old English chronicles call Scythia also as Scithia, Sice, Sithia, Barbaria (see [10]). Are there some “traces” of medieval name Scots (for Scyths) in modern Russia? Yes! It is known that Scyths are considered partially as the nation which cultivated the cattle. But before now the Russian term for “cattle” is SCOT. Our conjecture: the Scots mentioned in old English chronicles of 10-12th cc.A.D. are Scyths = Scithi which lived near Byzantine Empire on the territory (partially) of modern Russia. It was in 10-12th cc.A.D. Then, after transport of Byzantine chronicles into modern island Britain, the name of Scyths was also automatically shifted in modern England. And today we see in the modern England the Scyth-Land as Scot-Land. And we see again that the old English chronicle tell us about the real Byzantine history, because really Scyths of 10-12th cc.A.D. lived near Byzantine Empire. Nennius, in the section with title “About Scots when they captured Hybernia”, informs us: “If somebody wants to know when… Hybernia was uninhabited, desert, then the most informed among SCOTS told me the following. When the people of Israel went from Egypt, the Egyptians who haunted Israelits (according to the Bible), were sank in the Sea. Among the Egyptians was one noble man from SCYTHIA (! – Auth.) with many relatives and with many servants. He was expelled (banished) from his native kingdom and we was in Egypt when Egyptian army was sank in the Sea… Then the survived Egyptians decided to expel him from the Egypt because they afraid that he can captures their country and to establish his power in Egypt” ([8],p.174). Then, as a result, these Scyths were expelled from Egypt, and then their fleet conquered the Hybernia. This event is considered (in Nennius’ opinion) as conquest of Hybernia by Scots ([8],p.175). Thus, here we see that Nennius was sure that Scots were descended from Scyths.
It is possible that here the name Hybernia was in reality applied to the Hyberia = old name of modern Georgia (or, may be to the medieval Spain). It is supposed today in historical science that medieval Hybernia = Ireland. As we expect (and this is really true), the modern historical commentary to this fragment from Nennius’ chronicle is very angry: “Which Scythia is mentioned here? Bede Venerable calls the Scandinavia as Scythia. The version about “Scyths” origin of Scots was appeared because of some similarity between words “Scithia” and “Scottia” “([8],p.272). The commentator here passed over in silence that sometimes “Scots” were written in old English chronicles as “Scithi”, i.e., “Scyths” and this fact is well-known to the real experts in the ancient English history. See [2]. By the way, the replacement of Scythia by Scandinavia does not help, because (as we have demonstrated above), the old English chronicles sometimes identified Cansie = Scandinavia and Russia (Rossie) (see [10]): “Cansie (or Canzie), and I think that this is Rosie (in another copy of the manuscript – Russie – Auth.)” (see the discussion above). If it was really true that in some medieval historical period the Scithia was called as Scotland (in some historical chronicles), then the great interest will obtain the following fact. As we saw, the English chronicles called Russian king (ruler) Jaroslav the Sage (Wise) as Malescold (Malescoldus) ([10],p.58). Thus, his whole title (if Scythia was Scotland) should be Scottish (or Scoth) king Malescold (or Malcolm?). But we know several medieval Scottish kings Malcolms in traditional Scotland history. May be one of them is Russian king Jaroslav the Sage who was “transported” into “island Scottish history” as a result of chronological and geographical shift? 5.12. Five original languages of ancient Britain. Which nations used these languages and where did they live in 10-12th cc.A.D.? On the first page of Anglo-Saxon Chronicle the following important information is presented: “Here in this island (i.e. in Britain – Auth.) are five languages: English, British or Welsh, Irish, Pictish, and Latin… Picts came from the south from Scythia with warships, not many, and landed at first in northern Ireland, and there asked the Scots if they mights dwell there… And the Picts asked the Scots for wives… A part of Scots went from Ireland into Britain” ([2],p.3). Is there any contradiction between these facts and our identification of old English events with events of crusades epoch of 10-12th cc. A.D. in Byzantine empire? No contradiction! Moreover, here we see certain confirmation of our
conjecture. 1) Appearance of the name Anglia (English) in the old English history is quite natural – this is the evident reflection of well-known dynasty of Byzantine emperors: Angels = Angelus (1185-1204). 2) The name Latin is the reflection of Latin Empire in Constantinople (13th c. A.D.), and a little earlier – the reflection of a group of Latins who came in Byzantine Empire during crusades epoch. Then they settled here and founded several feudal states. 3-a) The name British = BRT (and its duplicate=equivalent Welsh, see [2]) also is presented in the medieval Byzantine history. This is the name of Prussians=Pruteni = PRT (see above). 3-b) The English term Welsh is also well-known in medieval Byzantine empire. It is sufficient to look in the table of Matuzova [10] to get an immediate answer: Vlach (or Blachi) = Welsh – this is Turci = Thurki = Turks. Really: Turks = Coralli, Thurki, Turci, Vlachi = Blachi, Ilac, Blac (!). The name Vlachi=Blachi or Volochi is well-known in the medieval Europe. Starting from 9th c. A.D., they lived on the territory of modern Romania = Rumania ([11],p.352) and they formed the state Valachia. It is remarkable that the another, second name for Valachia was Zara Rumanska, i.e. the Kingdom of Romania (or Rumania). The most serious influence (on the fate of the whole region) Valachia had in 14th c.A.D. The history of Valachia is closely connected with the history of Turkey. The medieval Valachia several times was in a heavy war with Turkey (with Osman Empire). In the end of 14th century and in the beginning of 15th century the rulers of Valachia became the vassals of Turkey ([11],p.356). Consequently, the names of Valachia (Welsh) and Turkey are closely connected in the whole medieval history of Byzantine Empire. Moreover, the name Vlachi is well-known in the history of Constantinople. One of the main residences of Byzantine emperors was in Vlachern Palace ([25],p.226-229). This “Palace was the favorite residence of Comnenus” ([15],p.137). Greeks called it Vlacherni. “Valachia (in the form Blakie) – is geographical name which is often used by Robert de Clari (and also by Geoffrey de Villehardouin) for the territory of Eastern Balkan” ([15],p.135). This region was called by Byzantine authors as Great Vlachia. In other words, the Great Vlachia is the part of the modern Bulgaria.
Thus, the old English name Welsh points out on Balkan’s Valachia of 9-15 cc. A.D., or on the Turkey, or on the whole Byzantine Empire. 4) The original (preimage) of Pictish (Picts, Pict = PCT) in Byzantine Empire is quite clear. It is well-known that the ancient name of Egypt was Copt (= CPT) or Gipt. Thus, we obtain the immediate answer: Picts – are Copts or Gipts (i.e., Egyptians). By the way, Anglo-Saxon Chronicle is quite right when speaking that Picts came (in Britain – Auth.) from the country which is in the South with respect to Scithia. Really, Egypt is in the South with respect to the Scythia. 5) And finally, what about the language IRISH ? Anglo-Saxon Chronicle states that some part of Scotts came from Ireland ([2],p.3). Besides this, at least in some historical epochs we have:”Down to the time of Alfred this term Scottas refers either to the Scots of Ireland or of the Irish kingdom of Argyll” ([2],p.3, comm.5). But this means that Ireland is the part of Scot-Land. Because we have possible identification of Scots of 10-12th cc. with Scyths, then we obtain the following conjecture: language Irish is Russian (RSH = Russia), because without vowels we have RSH – RSS, “irish” and “russian” sound very closely. Consequently, in this historical epoch we have: Ireland = Ire + Land is the Russia. We realize that this possible identification of Ireland (in some historical epoch) with Russia (and consequently, identification of Scotland with Scythia), can generate a certain irritation and even indignation of some scientists. Nevertheless, we are forced to repeat once more that all these conclusions follow from the text of old English chronicles, when we read them without the restrictions generated by traditional Scaliger’s chronology. By the way, may be not all readers know that the legendary English (British) king Arthur (who is one of the most famous rulers of ancient England and is placed traditionally approximately in the 5th c.A.D.) was in direct contact with the king of Russia (“and the king of Russia, the most severe of the knights”). This is the report of Layamon (the beginning of 13th century) – the author of the poem “Brut, or the Chronicle of Britain” ([23], see also [10],pp.247-248). By the way, in the time of the king Arthur the princess (or queen) of Russia was kidnaped (see [23]). When speaking about nations populated the old England, Galfridus tells us ([9],p.6): Normans, Britts, Saxs, Picts, Scots.
We spoke about Britts, Picts and Scots. Now – about Normans. 6) Normans play an important role in Byzantine Empire of 10-15 cc. They took part in crusades. However, it is possible, that Normans are simply one more variant for the name Romans. If so, they are Romans – Romei, the people who lived in Roman (Byzantine) empire. 7) Now – about Saxs (Saxons). “Saxs (Saxons) – German nation lived in northern Europe, mostly on the territory near North Sea. In 5-6 centuries Britain was conquered by German tribes… Galfridus usually calls he GERMAN INVADERS by generalized name SAXS (SAXONS), but in some cases speaks about Angls (Angels)” ([9],pp.229-230). Let us compare with Byzantine history. It is well-known that Germans took part in crusades. Consequently, Saxons (Saxs) and Angls (Angels) were among the nations which invaded into Byzantine empire in 10-12 centuries. Thus, finally we see that the old English chronicles tell here not about some small nations which, as supposed today, lived many years ago on the modern island England, but about real great nations, states and empires. These great medieval nations were well-known in medieval Byzantine empire and Mediterranean region. If so, the old English chronicles describe important events in medieval world (crusades et cetera). (From traditional point of view they speak about “local events” on isolated island). And only later, after the artificial transport of some Byzantine chronicles into modern island England, this remarkable history of great events was artificially compressed, “decreased in the size” and was transformed into “small” local history on sufficiently “small area” – on the one island. 5.13. Where were located six original English kingdoms Britain, Kent, Sussex, Wessex, Essex and Mercia in 10-12 centuries.? The answer is given in the previous section. All these states (and nations) are real states (and nations) of medieval Europe in 10-12th cc. They took part in the conquest of Byzantine empire and then they created several feudal crusaders states. 1) Britain – is, most likely, Prussia = Prutenia or Turkey (= Vlachia). 2) Kent is, according to J.Blaire [6], the Saxons region = Saxonia. Let us recall that in 10-12th cc. on the German territory there exists Saxons area = Saxonia. 3) Sussex = South Saxons. 4) Wessex = West Saxons. 5) Essex = East Saxons. 6) Mercia. Possible this is again Germany or some of its
part, because in the Middle Ages Germany was called Moesia and, for example, town Marburg was called Merseburg, i.e. Merse + Burg ([10],p.263). It is also possible that chronicles mean Turkey when speaking about Mercia (Mersia). See, for example, large town Mersin in Turkey on the coast of Mediterranean sea. Anyway, we see that all six old-English kingdoms of 10-12th cc. can be located in Europe around the Byzantine Empire and all of then took part in its “feudal-state organization” during crusades. And only later all these states and nations were “transported” into island England, were artificially “decreased in size” and were inserted in a modern textbooks, where they are considered today as the initial English kingdoms of 5-8th cc.A.D.REFERENCESA.T.Fomenko. Methods for Statistical Analysis of Narrative Texts and Applications to Chronology. (Recognition and Dating of Dependent Texts, Statistical Ancient Chronology, Statistics of Ancient Astronomical Records). – Moscow, Moscow Univ.Press, 1990.The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle. Translated and edited by G.N. Garmonsway. 1990, Everyman’s library, J.M.Dent & Sons Ltd: London.A.T.Fomenko, V.V.Kalashnikov, G.V.Nosovskij. Geometrical and Statistical Methods of Analysis of Star Configurations. Dating Ptolemy’s Almagest. – CRC Press, 1993.A.T.Fomenko. Investigations in the History of Ancient World and Middle Ages. Mathematical Methods for Analysis of Sources. Global Chronology. – Moscow, 1994 (in print).A.T.Fomenko. Criticism of Traditional Chronology of Antiquity and Middle Ages. In which Century We Live ? – Moscow, 1994 (in print). 6*. J.Blair, Blair’s Chronological and Historical Tables from the Creation to the Present Time etc., G.Bell & Sons, London, 1882.J.Blair. Chronological Tables. Russian translation: Moscow, Moscow University, vols.1,2. 1808-1809. 7*. C.Bemont and G.Monod, Histoire de l’Europe au Moyen Age. Paris, 1921.C.Bemont and G.Monod, Histoire de l’Europe au Moyen Age. Petrograd, 1915.Nennius. Historia Brittonum. In the book: Galfridus Monemutensis – “Historia Britonum”. – Russian translation. Moscow, Nauka, 1984.Galfridus Monemutensis. “Historia Britonum”. – Russian translation. Moscow, Nauka, 1984.V.I.Matuzova. English Medieval Sources. – Moscow. Nauka, 1979.History of the Middle Ages. – Editor: S.D.Skazkin. – Moscow, Vyschaya Schkola. 1977, vol 1.M.P.Alexeev. About Anglo-Russian relations in the epoch of Jaroslav the Wise. – Scientific Bulletin. Leningrad Univ.Press, 1945, No.4, p.31.Chronica magistri Rogeri de Houedone, ed. W.Stubbs. – RS, N 51, vol.II. London, 1869, p.236. English translation: The Annals of Roger de Hoveden, comprising the history of England and of other countries of Europe from A.D. 732 to A.D. 1201. Tr.H.T.Riley, vol.1-2. London, 1853 (Bohn’s Antiquarian Library). Ancient Laws and Institutes of England…, ed.B.Thorpe, vol.1. London, 1840, p.198.Robert de Clari. The Conquest of Constantinople. – Moscow, Nauka, 1986.
J.Sunderland. Holy Books in the Light of Science. – Severno- -Zapadnoye izdatelstvo, 1925 (in Russian). 17*.E.Bickerman. Chronology of the Ancient World. Thames & Hudson, London, 1968.E.Bickerman. Chronology of the Ancient World. Russian translation: Moscow, 1975. I.A.Kryvelev. Excavations in Biblical Countries. – Sovetskaya Rossiya, Moscow, 1965 (in Russian).N.A.Morozov. Christ. (The History of Human Culture from the Standpoint of the Natural Sciences). Moscow and Leningrad. 1926-1932. vols. 1-7. (In Russian). 20*.Gregoras, Nichephorus. Byzantinae historiae. In J.P.Migne Patrologiae cursus completus. Series graeca, t.148,149. Paris, 1857-1886.Gregoras, Nichephorus. Roman History. Peterburg, 1862. Russian translation.Alexandria: Romance of Alexander the Great. Leningrad, 1966. (In Russian). (According to the Russian chronicle of 15th century).Benoit de Sainte-Maure. Chronique des ducs de Normandie par Benoit, publee… par C.Fahlin, t.I. – In: Bibliotheca Ekmaniana universitatis regiae Upsaliensis, 55. Uppsala, 1951, p.8-11.Layamon. Brut, or the Chronicle of Britain. Ed. F.Madden, vol.II. London, 1847, pp.525-526, vv.22589-22602.A.T.Fomenko. Empirico-Statistical Analysis of Narrative Material and its Applications to Historical Dating. Volume 1: The Development of the Statistical Tools. Volume 2: The Analysis of Ancient and Medieval Records. – Kluwer Academic Publishers. 1994. The Netherlands.M.A.Zaborov. History of Crusades in Documents and Materials. – Moscow, Vyschaya Schkola. 1977.Geoffroy de Villehardouin. La conquete de Constantinople. – Historiens et chroniqueurs du moyen age. Ed. A.Pauphilet. P., 1963.The Concise Columbia Encyclopeadia. – Avon Books. 1983. Columbia University Press. USA.Bartholomaeus Angicus. – De proprietatibus rerum. Apud A.Koburger. Nurenbergi, 1492, lib.XV, cap.CXXXI.Ex Annalibus Melrosensibus Ed.F.Liebermann, R:Pauli. – MGH SS, t.XXVII. Hannoverae, 1885, p.439&The Chronicle of Bury St.Edmunds, 1212-1301. Ed. A.Gransden. London-Edinburgh, 1964, p.10.Peter Hunter Blair. Roman Britain and Early England, 55 B.C. – - A.D.871. – The Norton Library History of England. W.W.Norton & Company. New York. London. 1963.Christopher Brooke. From Alfred to Henry III, 871-1272. – The Norton Library History of England. W.W.Norton & Company. New York. London. 1961.A.L.Morton. A People’s History of England. Lawrence & Wishart Ltd. London. 1979.

Feathering the Bass Drum

Feathering the Bass Drum
— The Power of Subtlety
by Phillip Smith
“Four to the bar,” “four on the floor,” or “feathering”: These are the most common terms used in jazz to
describe the act of lightly playing 4 quarter notes per measure on the bass drum.
Feathering came to prominence during the big band and bebop years (1930s-1940s). Prior to that the bass
drum was played heavier and was a more integral sound within the band itself especially in Dixieland and
New Orleans brass band styles where the imitation of marching drummers was the norm.
Many drummers believe that feathering actually stopped during the bebop years, but that couldn’t be further
from the truth. With bebop drummers “dropping bombs” on the bass drum it gave many the impression
that feathering had been replaced by constant syncopated bass drum fills. However close listening to
many of the great be bop drummers — Kenny Clarke, Max Roach, Philly Joe Jones etc. — will reveal their
mastery of feathering. And before you say that it is an antiquated sound that modern drummers spurn, let
me remind you that contemporary drumming greats Carl Allen, Kenny Washington, Lewis Nash, Steve
Gadd, Jeff Hamilton and (the late) Tony Williams all feather(ed) the bass drum.
Feathering was originally a way to emphasize and add some percussive attack to the acoustic bassist’s quarter-
note walking line. However it also does several specific things for the drummer and the rest of the
band. First it lays a solid foundation for the entire group. It also adds a layer of bottom end to the drummers
individual sound. In a normal swing groove the basic instruments are all high pitched (cymbals, hi
hats, & snare), thus the addition of some low end to the mix lends stability to the groove. Finally it directly
effects how the drummer plays. The hands play differently over the top of a constant quarter note bass
pattern than without. The feathering motion provides a solid reference that allows the hands to play syncopated
rhythms against it. Also many drummers find that without feathering it makes them feel obligated to
play more syncopated bass drum and snare drum ideas to fill spaces.
TECHNIQUE
One of the most important factors in achieving the correct feathering volume and sound characteristics is
proper pedal technique. Most drummers using the feathering technique play with a felt beater on a medium
to loose tensioned pedal. The bass drum is generally double headed with no hole in the front head and
tuned higher and more open (sometimes totally open or with just a felt strip) than the “rock/funk” sound
with a pillow.
Begin with the heel down style of playing. Some drummers play heel up (and play heel up well) however,
most find it more relaxing and easier to feather with their foot resting the entire time. The heel down technique
produces a more legato, resonate sound which is generally desired for this style.
The leg should remain very relaxed much like when you are sitting, dangling your legs off a boat dock or
ledge. Your foot should be comfortably on the pedal with your heel on the heel plate, though some players
like to have their foot high up on the footboard with the toe-stop removed. Using the weight of your leg
and perhaps a bit of foot pressure should make the beater sit about 1 to 2 inches from the head. When
making the stroke you should strive to keep that 1 to 2 inch distance between the head and beater. The
space should only widen when you intend on making accented strokes.
The feathering stroke is compared to lightly tapping your toe, however, plenty of sound will be generated
from the small ankle movements. Allow the beater to rebound off the head. The finishing position should
2
be the same as the starting position. The main point is to get the bass drum head vibrating just enough to
generate some low end frequencies, you don’t need to hear the attack and definition of each note.
PRACTICE TIPS
A good exercise to test your new technique and improve your control of the pedal is to play quarter notes
spanning the dynamic spectrum. Keep the dynamic level of the hands and the left foot on the hi hat the
same and only change the dynamic level of the bass drum. Also work on the inverse of this, keep the quarter
notes on the bass drum very soft and change the dynamic level of the other limbs. This will help you
develop the independence and touch needed to effectively feather the bass drum.
Practice feathering using the Chapin book, Advanced Techniques for the Modern Drummer. Play the entire
first half of the book with a light four on the floor. Also try feathering with many of the systems created
for use with the Ted Reed book, Syncopation. There are many other books available which will give you
plenty of practice on feathering. With a little creativity you can develop your own system of practice in no
time.
After a while put your new skill to work with some recorded music. There are numerous trio recordings
available that do not use drummers, the most common configuration being piano, bass and guitar. Many
of these recordings also feature legendary players such as Ray Brown, Ron Carter, and Christian McBride.
“Playing” with the masters is a great way to perfect your time, feel, touch and sound.
Lastly, make sure you spend some time playing brushes. Playing with brushes is an artform unto itself, and
a good brush technique on the drumset incorporates feathering the bass drum.
SOUND & APPLICATION
If you are ever in a playing situation where someone turns to you and tells you to stop playing the bass
drum, you are playing it too loudly. The old saying, “felt but not heard,” is never truer in this sense. The
feathering technique should never be heard as a separate rhythm riding above the volume of the rest of the
drumset. However it should be noticed when it is REMOVED from the foundation of the kit.
I’ve consciously experimented with stopping the bass drum during playing situations to see what effect it
might have on the music and my fellow players. In every encounter the entire group noticed that something
seemed to have gone wrong. One band member put it succinctly by saying it felt like the bottom had
dropped out of the group.
Practice, practice, practice and then practice some more. Feathering is foreign and difficult to master for
some, but mastering the technique is extremely rewarding and will add a tremendous amount of depth to
your playing. In time, feathering will become as natural as the jazz ride pattern or the hi hat on 2 & 4.
Plus, who knows, maybe the guys in the band will notice a whole new feel and depth to your playing.
Never underestimate the power of subtlety.
This article appeared in the September 2002 issue of Modern Drummer magazine and is reprinted with their permission.
Phillip Smith is a professional drummer and educator located in Atlanta, GA. He has performed with James
Williams, Donald Brown, George Coleman and many other jazz greats. He is currently the drummer for the
Bill Anschell trio and the Atlanta Symphony Pops Orchestra. Phillip is a clinician for Bosphorus cymbals and
also endorses Regal Tip sticks and brushes and Aquarian drum heads.
Summary of the main points in
The Art of Practice
Developing good practice skills can be an art form in itself. What we practice and how we practice are
very important to ones development as a musician.
WHAT DO YOU PRACTICE?
This will be different for everyone depending on your stage of musical development and what you need
in order to move forward. Here are some ideas and recommendations:
1 – Practice whatever you need to do a better job on the gigs you are currently playing. You will have
some relevant ideas to work on by remembering what songs or feels you had trouble with, listening
to a recording of the gig or by using feedback from the other band members.
2 – I recommend studying with a good private teacher to learn how to read music, develop good technique,
be exposed to interesting ideas and approaches, and to get clear and instant feedback on your
progress. By studying with a teacher you can also develop good practice discipline because you’ll
need to prepare a weekly lesson.
3 – Use your practice time to work on and develop your own ideas.
4 – Use your practice time to learn music and prepare for an upcoming gig, session or audition.
5 – Work on an idea that interests you that you read about in a magazine or that you hear someone play
on a CD, a live gig/clinic or an educational DVD/video.
HOW DO YOU PRACTICE?
Here are some practicing principles I use that have helped me continue to grow as a player.
1 – Practice Every Day with an occasional day off.
2 – Be Organized and Consistent – know what you are going to practice each day and stick to the plan.
3 – Use Patience and Take Your Time.
4 – Practice Quietly and Slowly. By doing this you gain control at many Volumes and Tempos.
5 – Figure out the Stickings and Hand/Foot combinations. With this process you gain an understanding
of the information in the idea. With Consistent, Slow and Relaxed practice you allow the
information to enter your subconscious.
6 – Slowly work out the motions necessary to play the ideas and eventually allow the motions start to
“play themselves.”
7 – Breath slowly, relax and use the practice as a meditation. Develop the habit of playing relaxed,
don’t hold tension in your body. Use a mirror to watch your motions.
8 – Eventually “hear” the idea in your head and allow your body to respond and play it effortlessly.
9 – Practice with Musical Form, (e.g. 4 & 8 bar phrases, 12 bar blues, 32 bar AABA song form) play
along with CDs, and practice both with and without a click track.
10 – Warm up before the practice session, stop when fatigued.

Medieval: Total War Unofficial Strategy Guide v 1.0

Medieval: Total War Unofficial Strategy Guide v 1.0
By: Lap
Email: l_a_p@hotmail.com
Date: 10/28/02
=============================================

Table of Contents
—————–
1. Introduction
2. Starting off
3. Getting Your Bearings
4. What now?
5. Water, Navies, and Trade
6. Diplomacy
7. Keeping the Peace (or keeping those peasants in line)
8. Vices and Virtues
9. Strategic Agents
10. Crusades and Jihads
11. The Church
12. The Inn
13. Sieging
14. Auto-Calcing
15. Advanced Strategies
16. Battles
|
|- Charging

17. Faction Suggestions (Early Age)
18. Legal Stuff

Introduction
————

Medieval: Total War is a game of infinite replayability and there is no way to
make a definitive walkthrough. Therefore, this guide does not contain a
walkthrough in any form. What is does contain is hints, tips, and strategy.
This guide does not list the units or buildings because if you bought M:TW then
you should already have this.

Starting Off
————

Once you have completed all the tutorials you should then try going for the
full blown campaign. I suggest not worrying about the difficulty you select
right now as that can be changed. Starting in the early period is recommended
because it is not so frantic and you won’t have 100 different unit thrown at
you in the beginning. Now comes the first hard decision you will have to make;
who to be? There is no real “best” group to be although some are clearly more
powerful than others. Since this is your first time you should make sure to
read all the descriptions for each group since they include almost every pro and
con of your group. For the first game try and choose a group that has a
difficulty of easy or normal. Once you have decided then go back to the main
menu and NOW decide your difficulty. If you are a Shogun veteran you might as
well play at a combined difficulty of normal or above or you may quickly get
bored. When I say combined difficulty I mean that if your group has a
difficulty of easy and you pick a game difficulty of hard then you have a
combined difficulty of normal. Please take note that the AI does not get
smarter past normal, they just cheat and get more money. New players should
have a combined difficulty of easy or normal. Now you can really get started in
building an empire (NOTE: The next few chapters assume you have chosen Early
Period although they can be helpful on any age).

Getting Your Bearings
———————

The first thing you do once you are actually in the campaign map is to take a
look around. You probably won’t be able to see much but that won’t be for long.
Right-click and examine all the territories you can see. Take note of how much
income they have, resources, trade goods, terrain, other specialties and
buildings there. Try to make a basic idea of which areas you think are most
important for you to defend or conquer. It is a good idea to incorporate allies
into your plan right from the start. Just make sure not to become to dependent
on a certain ally since you may not even be able to get him to ally with you or
he could backstab you later. On to getting buildings.

What Now?
———

Your first thought is probably “what to build?”. What you decide to build is
all dependent on what kind of strategy you are going to use as well as the
group you choose. Take a good long look at the fold out tech tree that came
with the game since this will be very useful the entire game. Now is a good
time to put together a basic strategy. Here are some you should think about:

The Diplomat-

This strategy involves using an almost complete defensive plan that
incorporates a slew of strategic agents. This is a good decision if you are bad
at the real time battles, just want something different, or if caution is just
your nature. The diplomats will concentrate on building up most of their
starting provinces since it is not likely that they will be conquering much.
Diplomats are preferably Christians with starting points that have convenient
trade options available to them (for example the Italians) as this will allow
them to make a lot of money while maintaining friendly relations with most
nations (this also helps with trading). Diplomats must use spies, emissaries,
inquisitors, and assassins to be successful. Making sure the enemy has few good generals as well as figuring out which side to take in wars will definitely be a high priority for the Diplomat. Bribing enemy armies and launching crusades will become the norm as the Diplomat.

Pros: If you can balance your enemies and allies while at the same time
manipulating the computers actions and units you can win the game using a
satisfying “invisible hand” method. Few provinces means it’s easier to guard
and defense is always easier than attack.

Cons: Not very expansive and you can easily get demoralized if you keep looking at the quick expansionist strategies the computer uses sometimes. Can seem weaker later in the game and this strategy is usually only meant to be kept until half way through the game (expert players can follow this method out the whole game if they are good).

The Moderate-

Seriously not much to say about type of player. They are the average player and most people will end up becoming them. They use a little of everything and have no actually strong point. Good in all areas.

Pros and Cons: None

The Warlord-

Everyone knows the warlord and whether you love or hate him he is here to stay.
The warlords concentrate on war and war alone. All efforts focus on more troops and maintaining a minimum defense of all conquered territories. The warlord
can quickly crush an entire faction but he can be brought down just as easy.

Pros: Most players that are good commanders love being able to do cool real
time battles. Can quickly gain the upper hand and their King’s usually have a
higher influence.

Cons: Because of the speed at which warlords expand at they are exceptionally vulnerable to have their empire crumble in just a few years. If the AI was a little more intelligent the amount of warlords would decrease dramatically
(further information on this will be explained later).

Now that you have seen the three most basic strategies you must decide which general direction your leaning too. You should then build accordingly.

Some generic tips about building:

-Build up your most valuable places first.

-Make each place build only 1-3 types of units. So one place should make only heavy cavalry, the other siege engines, other ships, other archery, etc.

-Build farm upgrades in every location that initially gives you more than 250
income (if you want you can put them in all your places but improving the
farmland 20% of a place that only gives you 50 bucks only means an extra 2.5
flourins).

-Build trading posts in places that have 2 or more tradable goods.

-Try to establish a long term plan for provinces. Make sure that if your goal
is to get gothic knights in a hundred years that you follow the tech tree from
the start to save you time and money.

-If a province makes a specific regional only unit make sure that you make an effort to build the needed structures to build that unit. Regional units are
always more powerful than similar units of similar costs. This is especially
true with Switzerland. Take Switzerland as fast as possible since it contains
the best spear units in the game.

-If a province gives +1 valor to a specific unit type it is only intelligent to
have that place building that kind of unit instead of the next province over
(there are some situational exceptions of course).

-If you have faction or religion only units in your tech tree try and work
towards them. These units, like regional units, are far more powerful than
generic units of the same type.

-Make sure that you don’t have important provinces with idle build orders.
Medieval: Total War has so many useful structures you can build almost the
entire game.

Water, Navies and Trade
———————–

Another feature new to the Total War series is the more interactive use of the
seas. Although this section may seem out of place this early in the game I
really have to stress the fact that the seas are important. Also if you are a
group with easy sea access you will want to try and set up trade as early as
possible. Controlling the seas is now extremely important and only increases as
the game goes on. The oceans allow you to get immense masses of wealth as well
as the ability to transfer units across the map in one turn. Personally, I
thought the MTW manual was very vague regarding trade and the sea so I will
clarify.

To begin your navy you are going to have to have at least one port. Once this
is built you will also have to build a shipwright so you can start building a
boat. You should build the cheapest boat possible and in three turns (yes it
takes 3 turns to make a ship of any kind so remember that it can clog up army
production in that territory). Now you have a near useless ship and almost
nothing will come from it alone. The only ability a lone ship has is fighting
other ships (this one is so weak that there isn’t even a point) and to scout out
coastal territories. What you need to do is make more ships. When you get your next ship move it out to the next sea territory. This creates a supply
chain/trade route to any foreign ports that are adjacent to the sea territories.
If you have a dock in a territory you can now transport units to any land
territory adjacent to your chain of ships. This is incredibly useful when
fighting across an ocean and if a lot of your places have docks than you can
have an army than can move throughout your empire in one turn.

Trading with ships is the primary use of a navy. To trade, set up a supply
chain/trade route to a foreign port as explained above. Next you need to build a trading post. Right-click the trading post you have to see how much money you are gaining from trade. This is dependent upon the amount of tradable
resources of the territories that are trading as well as the type of your trade
building you have. The perfect trade route would involve many foreign
territories that have a lot of tradable resources. You should try to make sure
you have ports in territories that have 2 or more tradable resources and that
they have the highest type of trade building you can stand to have. Here is a
list of things that you should check if your trade route isn’t working:

1. Do you have a trading post in your territory?
2. Is there an unbroken line of ships to the foreign territory?
3. Do both your territory and theirs have a port?
4. Are there any enemy ships in any sea territory that your trade route is in?
5. Do both territories have tradable resources?
6. Are you at war with the target nation?

Ships of nations you are at war with break trade routes. You cannot trade past the point where the line is broken and you cannot transport troops past that point either. This can be devastating. Some nations may rely almost completely on income from trade and by placing a single ship in the trade route you can bankrupt them rather quickly. For example, I was playing as Italy with almost 2/3 of my income from trade and I had a large standing army. The Byzantines declared war one me and broke my trade routes. I was about 1500 short every turn and I was forced to choose between setting my troops on a rampage to pillage and kill themselves (so I wouldn’t have to pay support) or trying to make peace with the Byzantines. It broke my empire in half. So you should also remember to have either very strong ships in your trade route or a few extra ships guard the routes.

Making amphibious landings is a great way to catch the computer by surprise.
Most of the time the computer keeps minimal forces inside its empire while most of their forces are spent guarding their boarders. This is also useful for
quick in and out slash and burn attacks. This is especially fun as the Danes
early in the game, using Vikings to pillage everyone’s territories. You must
remember that if you make a landing upon a territory could mean that you might have no way back. If for example, you land your invasion force in Ireland you will not be able to transport that army back until you build a port in Ireland.
Even if the place you are invading has a port when you invade it you shouldn’t expect it to be there after your troops are done pillaging it. It is for this reason that you should expect your army to be a suicide army. If your army survives and establishes a foothold in the territory you attacked, or if they make it back to the Motherland safely just consider it an added bonus.

Control of the seas is important to all but some of the most landlocked nations of the world (like Poland). You should strive to get trade routes established with major trading ports (Constantinople, Antioch, and Venice are all places that can get over 1000 flourins a year JUST from properly established trade).
Even if you don’t have any good trade opportunities having a few ships can be useful for either harassing your enemies trade routes as well as transporting your troops. A few well placed ships can save your armies turns upon turns of movement. Bottom line; Do not underestimate the power of navies.

Diplomacy
———

Diplomacy is definitely an aspect of the game that you can choose to pursue to any extent you wish. How far you choose to pursue it usually depends on what you enjoy more. Do you enjoy trampling your opponents with a massive army or watching your opponents ex-allies crush them as they succumb to inner treachery? Both are equally satisfying and can radically alter the game. The emissary and princess are your two most basic units for establishing diplomatic ties. The princess is usually your best bet to getting an alliance or cease fire with a nation. This option is not always available since princesses are randomly created by your married king. It is also important to note that any Muslim nation will not produce any princesses ever. If you do not have any princesses an emissary will do although they do not have as high of chance of having their offer accepted.

Try to establish allies wherever you can. Whenever you go to war you should try and have it so that you are allied with every nation except the one that you are at war with. Fighting on two or more fronts because you angered too many nations is usually not a good idea. Before you go to war with anyone you should look at the diplomacy screen and figure out who the target nation is allied with. Starting a war with a nation could get your alliances canceled or you may have a few more people to fight. It’s not uncommon to see over five of your allies bail out on their alliance with you after you attack someone. The computer usually goes with whatever ally has more influence and power but I have seen nations side with nations as small as the Aragonese even though I controlled half of Europe.

In summary, diplomacy is a very simple concept that you can use how you please.
Basically, just try to have a lot of allies backing you up and always make sure
that anything you do diplomatically should be to your benefit.

Keeping the Peace (or keeping those peasants in line)
—————————————————–

Rebellions, riots, and discord…You will become familiar with rebels and their
incessant annoyances. Rebellions will be a constant the entire game. You should
learn to use the shift key often (every turn actually) to make sure that none
of your provinces will be attacked by rebels. If you are having a problem with
high rebellion chances in your territories here are some tips to remedy the
situation:

-The easiest thing to do is lower taxes. This is the first thing you should do.

-Produce cheap to make armies with a large unit size. Feudal sergeants and
spearmen are good units to quell a rebellious populace. The larger the unit
size, the more they lower the chance of rebellion.

-Look at the territories religious demographic. It is harder to control a
population that worships Allah if you are a Christian kingdom. Put some priests of your religion there to lower the chance of rebellion. A church has the same effect.

-Examine the governor of the territory. If the governor has some awful traits
attached to him that lower happiness that could be why your subjects are so
unruly. A governor with low dread and/or low piety could be the reason for
unhappiness. If your territory has a high level of zeal than piety is more
important to the general than dread. Otherwise dread is the larger factor. If
there is no governor than find one with high piety or dread. All of your
territories should have governors as there is almost always no downside to
having them.

-Are you excommunicated? If you are Christian and you have displeased the pope
you may have gotten excommunicated. You can easily tell if you are
excommunicated by looking at any of your generals and looked at the crosses in
piety. If they are broken you are excommunicated. Being excommunicated angers
your subjects depending on how zealous they are.

-Check out the vices of your king. Did he just get a vice that lowers
happiness? This applies to every territory you have. There is very little you
can do about this.

-Is the province recently conquered? If it is then lower the taxes to very low
and put some more troops on that province. The populace will slowly accept your
rule.

-Do none of the following seem to apply? The province may just be a naturally
unruly place. This is especially true of Scotland and Portugal who can become
very rebellious for no reason at all. Sometimes you may have to consider if the
province is really worth keeping. Personally, sometimes I would just let the
rebels have it. If you have to have a massive army kept on the territory at all
times with very low taxes on the province you might actually be wasting money.
The support of that army may actually outweigh the amount of money being
produced by the province.

I really have to stress using the shift key every turn. Provinces can become
filled with unrest for almost no reason at all. The larger your empire gets the
more rebellions become a problem. Provinces that you have held for the entire
game may start to act up and if kept unchecked they can bring your empire to
its knees. Your expansion is usually not actually halted by the enemy but the
rebels. Say you attack a neighboring province with 1000 men. You lose 400 or so
in the battle for the territory. Depending on the territories previous loyalty
and your religion you may find that even with very low taxes that place may
still have a high chance of rebellion. Now you are essentially stuck in that
territory. If you move the army out of the province you are likely to have a
loyalist uprising in that territory. Speaking of loyalist rebellions, here is a
list of the different kinds of rebellions:

Peasant Uprising-This is the weakest of the different kinds of uprisings. An
army of peasants that is easily dispatched by a force, usually less than half
their number. These occur when one of your usually loyal territories is taxed
too much.

Religious Uprising-These can actually be a problem. They are created when the
province becomes disloyal do to the religious neglect in that province. These
armies contain a multitude of units.

Bandits-These are about as dangerous as the religious uprisings. They only
occur when there is no castle or less than 100 units in the province.

Loyalist Uprising-These are by far the most dangerous uprisings. They can
contain generals of almost any power and troops to match. This isn’t really why
they are that powerful. It’s more the fact that your enemy has control of this
army. So if you are defending a province and a loyalist rebellion occurs while
you are being attacked, the computer now has a larger force to fight against
you. The worst possible scenario you can get yourself into with these things is
if you leave a territory unguarded, or if you are retreating from that province
back to a safer one, odds are a Loyalist rebellion will spring up and the
computer might have even more of a force than they had when you first attacked.
Luckily, loyalist rebellions only happen in the most previously loyal of
conquered territories.

When you actually defeat a rebellion you are given three options:

1. Kill/Enslave them all – Lowers chance of rebellion but may give the king
some bad traits
2. Kill/Enslave the ringleaders – Kind of a neutral thing.
3. Release them all – Can give your king a mercy trait that adds happiness.

NOTE: While not really rebellions faction reappearances are actually more
dangerous than Loyalist uprisings. These happen when randomly after a faction
has been eliminated. A lost heir will appear and about 3 large armies will
attack three or so of your provinces. These always appear in a place where the
faction occupied. These reappearance become brutal later in the game when there
is so many eliminated factions and you have a larger area to protect.

Vices and Virtues
—————–

One of the most unique things about MTW is the introduction of the vices and virtues system wherein generals, governors, and royalty gain traits depending
upon their actions. This system is very important to pay attention to as it can
make or break your empire in multiple ways.

Right-clicking on any leader will bring up information on them. The different
traits can all be explained just by moving your mouse over the trait. You will
want to take note of the following:

Loyalty: This is probably the least important trait. This trait is almost
always near or at full and if it is not just assign that person a land title.
Unless you are frequently losing or are a very weak country, your generals
should all have relatively high loyalty. While I consider this trait relatively
low on your priority list it should be put to the top if any of your leaders
has a low amount of loyalty. This is because leaders with low loyalty are very
dangerous. Not only can they defect from your rule but if enough of your
leaders are disloyal a civil war with start (I believe a leader of royal blood
must also be disloyal for this to occur but don’t risk it at all). The civil
wars will take roughly half of your territories and pit them against the
remaining territories. This is devastating even though you are allowed to
choose which side you favor in the rebellion. A civil war will basically stop you
from doing anything until you get your land restored. During this time
computers like to “liberate” your rebellious territory. You’ve got a few options
if you want to raise the loyalty of your nobles.

-Give them a land or office title (Try to distribute all of your titles).

-If you have an extra princess lying around getting old and fat you might as
well have her marry one of the generals (although you must remember that this
gives the noble royal status).

-If all else fails, have an emissary strip the noble of his title and give the
title to a more qualified candidate.

Piety: Piety has only two real functions. One is to make it harder for the
noble to be tried by an inquisition and two is to make zealous territories
happy. Try to have high piety nobles governing highly zealous territories.

Dread: This is the most important in keeping your territories in line. High
dread means the people fear and respect the governor and they will rebel less
(if you want proof, take a place that has a high chance of rebellion and assign
it a governor with high dread). A very easy way to get some dread is to
slaughter prisoners in battle for no reason (gotta love the sound that button
makes).

Command: This is very important in battle. Each command increases the valor of
everyone in that army. Command is a key factor in every battle and it is taken
into consideration a lot when you auto-calc a battle. You can easily gain
command by having generals win battles.

Acumen: This is right up there with command on the importance scale. For the
most part you should have a few good generals and everyone else should be nerdy
acumen heavy governors. Also try and make your good generals governors of the
lesser territories unless they have high acumen. Whenever you have a high
income territory like Constantinople or Venice you should strive to get find a
general with the most acumen you can find. You should even go to the extent of
looking within army stacks. Meaning that you should check out your army stacks
and then look inside them, right clicking each unit on the bottom to see if
there’s some general you haven’t noticed that is brimming with potential. Having
a few more acumen on a general in a key region can mean around 500 extra
flourins a turn in a place that may have only produced 750 before.

The Other Stuff: There are tons of traits that can be listed at the bottom of
the nobles information window. These are really what you have to watch out for.
They are only really dangerous because a lot of the traits are gained randomly
and the changes they cause can be quite dramatic. Here are a few of the more
common/important ones:

NOTE: All X’s mean there are many words that are just used as different degrees
for this trait.

Secret X – There are many secret traits that your leaders can have. Only spies
can uncover them. Until they are uncovered they really have no effect.

X Builder- You get the “X Builder” title depending on how much you build. This
is usually given to the king and means more happiness.

Hesitant- This one is as annoying as it is uncommon. Any time you say “Call off
the attack” in the attack method menu you have a chance of getting this trait.
Hesitant gives you -2 morale.

Skilled/Expert Defender/Attacker- These traits all give you either a +1 or +2
bonus to command when attacking or defending. You get these traits by doing a
good job defending or attacking.

Skilled/Expert Last Stand- This is one of my favorites. These traits give you a
bonus to command when you are outnumbered by more than 2 to 1. It’s quite a
status symbol.

Questionable Courage/Coward- These traits are devastating. What could be worse
than when you are losing battles than having your generals become worse? If you
retreat you will most likely get a coward related trait that effects morale.

X Leader-These are excellent as they give a massive bonus in combat. Make
people with any of these traits your generals.

X Warrior- Usually a bonus to health and valor. Gained by the general’s unit
performing well in combat.

Not So Bold- When your generals sits back for too many battles you get this
negative trait.

Gluttony- When the taxes in a province are high the governor may get this
negative trait.

There are so many more traits but most of them are acquired randomly and most
of them are fully explained just by passing over the trait with the mouse. The
main things you need to do are to check all your major generals to make sure
they are combat worthy. One of the most important things to look for is that
the general doesn’t have many (or any) low morale modifiers. You could have a
general with 8 command but if he has -6 morale your better off with a 1 command
general. Nothing is worse than when you go into battle with a huge well
equipped army and right when you are about to close in for the kill your
soldiers see (Not even start to fight but just SEE) an enemy unit they all
high-tail it out of there.

Also take note that all of your king’s territory affecting traits effect all of
your territories. This can mean immense benefits for your kingdom but it also a
double edged sword. Say for example that your king has a trait that gives a
territory 10% agricultural bonus. This bonus applies to all territories! It is
best used for the +10 happiness modifiers since you will have far less
rebellions, Unfortunately, this can destroy your entire empire. Let’s say you
have +20 happiness on your king and you are a fairly large empire. Now let’s
imagine that you have just conquered a few territories and you are just barely
keeping them from rebellion. Then your king dies. Suddenly you lose that +20
happiness bonus and half your provinces, even ones that didn’t seem to be a threat
before are rebelling like mad. This is why it’s usually a good idea to start
reinforcing all your territories when your king begins to reach old age. You
never know when your king will die.

*Through rebellion comes peace* – This is a little trick you can use to make
your entire kingdom happier. If you have a rebellion on your hands (or you can
just make one by being a bastard to the people) you can then eliminate the
rebellion and when you are given the choice of what to do choose to let them
all go. This usually gives your king the trait Occasional Mercy +10 or
Frequent Mercy +20 and -2 dread. This bonus applies to all your territories so
I suggest that each one of your kings get Occasional Mercy.

Strategic Agents
—————-

All strategic agents are useful scouts. So if they aren’t doing anything have
them moving around. Remember that strategic agents can also use a dock to
travel to any other dock in the world.

Emissary- Used for making alliances or cease fires. They can also be dropped on your own nobles to strip them of their title (This is useful for when say, your governor of Constantinople just got a trait that saps half the cash from his territory). Remember that striping a noble of his title will result in a eduction in loyalty. Emissaries can also bribe generals to your side.

Assassin- Ah, who doesn’t love a cold blooded killer for hire? With these
deliverers of death you can try and assassinate any strategic agent save a jihad or crusade depending on the valor of your unit and the valor/rank of the target.

Spy- Spies are your best source of information and they are especially useful for finding out how powerful enemy generals are. They can also uncover hidden traits. Spies can attempt to bribe gate guards to open castle doors.

C. Bishop/O. Priest/Alim- These are all religious men that increase the
percentage of people believing in a certain religion. Remember to use these to quell religious rebellions by changing the religion to yours. It is also
usually a good idea to put some of your priests in a territory you are planning
on conquering so that it’s easier to control once you conquer it.

C. Cardinal/O. Bishop/Imarn- These are improved religious men.

Inquisitor- Used to raise the zeal in whatever province the inquisitor is in.
After around 60% zeal or so the province will become out of control and many
people will die. Think of putting one in an enemies place for fun. NOTE:
Catholic priests and bishops will reduce the effect of Inquisitors if they are
in the same province. Inquisitors can also be dropped on nobles to try them for
heresy. The chance of success depends on the valor of the inquisitor and the
piety of the target.

Grand Inquisitor- Improved Inquisitors.

Crusades and Jihads
——————-

Crusades and jihads can be your best friend or worst enemy. Crusades are
available only to Catholic factions and Jihads are available only to Muslims.
Sorry Orthodox factions, you guys get the shaft. Anyways crusades are only used
when attacking provinces and jihads are used for reclaiming conquered provinces
(AKA a sort of defense). Both crusades and jihads are dependent on zeal.
Without a good amount of zeal the crusade or jihad will be weak and/or fail.
Crusades and jihads are very useful early in the game and continually become
weaker as the game progresses. This is due to the advancement of technology and
the decline of the church. Zeal is usually always on the decline so it is best
to use the crusades and jihads as fast as possible. All you need to do is build
a jihad or crusade, select an appropriate target and that’s pretty much it.

Crusades that pass through Christian lands gain followers depending on the
province’s zeal. They will even take troops from your enemies and add them to
you. By doing this you can essentially have your enemies fight for you. Leaders do have the option of not letting the crusade pass, in which case a fight will ensue. This rarely happens though. Crusades also produce unique units. These can be fanatics, order foot soldiers, Teutonic sergeants, Knights of Santiago, Teutonic knights, knights hospitaller, and knights templar. All except the fanatics and order foot soldiers are among the best cavalry in the game. The order foot soldiers can also give you an edge. These units, if used quickly in the beginning of the game can annihilate enemies.

Another great thing about crusades and jihads is that you can effectively use
them to have an entire army cross one of your allies territories. You can drop
any army you want into the crusade (although they cannot leave until the
crusade is over). I personally love being the Spanish and sending a crusade
that contains all my armies through France, Germany, and Italy on it’s way to
take Constantinople.

If the Pope calls for a crusade and you send a crusade to whatever the Pope
asks you to do you won’t have to pay him to start the crusade. You can also not start crusades if you are excommunicated.

Many of the following also applies to jihads.

Pros of crusades: Can cross other nations you don’t want to go to war with and at the same time you can steal their troops. Very powerful units are produced from crusades.

Cons of crusades: Takes four years to make. Can’t be done if excommunicated.
Costs a lot of money and cannot change it’s destination territory. Becomes
useless late in game.

The Church
———-

The Papacy is annoying as hell. They are natives of Rome and will reappear
every so often if you conquer them. The Pope will excommunicate you if you
fight Christians and me call for crusades against you. The Pope may
occasionally send you money if you are an extremely good with “spreading gods
word”. I would only take on the papacy if you feel you have absolutely no need
for crusades. If the papacy is destroyed so are all excommunications. You can
also build your own churches too increase faith. Constructing cathedrals will
amplify the effect and give you money from it.

The Inn
——-

The inn is a great tool. It allows you to attract mercenary units of any kind.
If you have a wealth of money I would suggest building a couple of these. The
support costs for the units are immense but inns can provide entire armies in
case of emergencies. Mercenaries cannot become governors or be resuplied.
Remember to disband excess mercenary units if you are getting low on cash.

Sieging
——-

Whenever you siege a castle the easiest way to win it is to just sit there. The
easiest way to defend against a siege is to just sit there and hope for
reinforcements. Exciting, huh? The only time you should ever attack a castle is
if it is a key territory and you need it right then and there. I would still
only recommend doing this if right-clicking on the castle reveals that you
still have over 3 years before the castle falls. Only sally forth from the
castle if you have far more units than your opponent. Remember if you siege to
have plenty of siege weapons.

Auto-Calcing
————

There comes a time when battle become repetitive (especially in non-crucial
battles versus rebels and such). When this time comes it means that it is time
for the auto-calc (or letting the computer resolve the battle for you).
Generally the computer will almost always do worse for you than a skilled
player so I would advise against using this all the time. Auto-calc works well
if you have a lot of command/valor/morale and a mixed force. The computer DOES
take into account the combination of units you have so don’t think just by
making 1000 peasants that the computer will favor your 1000 peasants vs. 500 well trained troops. If you auto-calc a siege try to have at least some siege weapons.

Advanced Strategies
——————-

If you are losing in the big picture the easiest thing to do is defend and wait
for an attack. As a human you should be able to defend against over 3x your
number. After you crush an invasion counterattack the weakened force and take some territory in the process.

Slash and Burn- This is one of my favorite strategies since it solves so many
problems. This strategy involves taking everything you have (save garrisons for stopping rebels) and spreading to any province you can take. The entire goal is not to gain land. The goal is to destroy your enemies buildings and kill troops. This strategy usually results in a huge cash influx. You can then use this to support massive armies. I am occasionally force into using this
strategy when my empire gets enormous. When you are going bankrupt this is the ultimate solution to your support costs because
A. It will kill a lot of your
men (no more support) as well as the enemies.
B. You get tons of cash pillaging
C. The enemy will be set back many years because of all the stuff you destroy.
You might also actually get to keep one or two of the territories you take too.
The only con to this are that you could keep the generic level of technology
down (not that you might care but…). You can use this on a broad scale if you want. All you have to do is keep a central production area (Constantinople for
example) and keep the rest of the world in ruin. This insures you will have the best units. This strategy is great fun as the Vikings.

Scorched Earth- This is useful for retreating. When you know the province you are looking at will get miserably crushed next turn. All you have to do is sell all the buildings in the territory and withdrawal all your troops to a larger force or more defensible territory. Your enemy will probably have to face rebels too (just make sure you don’t move all your troops away if you know there may be a loyalist rebellion if you leave.

Wealth Beyond Measure- Feasibly only obtainable as Italy, Egypt, or
Constantinople since you need a lot of money to pull this one off. This one
involves merely defending every major sea port and ruling the seas. Each major dock territory can make over 1000 flourins a turn. You can just buy armies through mercenaries or bribery.

For the Glory of God- This strategy is better known as “Crusades Everywhere!”.
This works very well with the zealous Spanish. All you have to do is
continually make crusades as soon as possible and load them up with everything you can find. Strike quick and fast.

The Wall- This strategy is very popular and can be used by any nation. All it
involves is keeping all your troops on the borders and minimal troops behind
it. The advantage is that you are very hard to be invaded but things like
rebels and reappearing factions can cripple you in no time.

The Moving Wall- This strategy works best if you have many high tech units. All you have to do is only attack weak territories and really only play a defensive game. You just pick a lot of high tech defensive units and slowly advance, never attacking a large force. This works so well because defenders always have an advantage.

Heir Elimination- The goal is not to conquer and entire faction but to make it
disappear completely by killing all the heirs. Assassins, inquisitors, and army kill squads all become focused on hunting down every last heir. This is a very risky but fun strategy. All forces in battle should focus on killing the
heirs/kings.

Zerg- Everyone loves getting Zerg rushed! This strategy involves tons and tons of cheap units thrown everywhere. Vikings, Scottish Highlanders, Steppe Calvary, Woodsmen, Militia Sergeants…pretty much anything that is cheap to make. Just continually produce these units and win with sheer numbers. This strategy works well in conjunction with the Slash and Burn strategy. Rebellions are also easy to prevent since you have so many units to use for garrison.

Battles
——-

Eventually you will have to take the field of battle (and if you don’t you
shouldn’t play MTW). This is a whole different game here and mastering it can be hard. You’ll learn to love it after you watch your own home grown army crush your enemies. Commanding battles yourself should always mean a better kill ratio but the downside is that battles take time. I definitely don’t suggest actually commanding every battle that happens since that would take forever.
Anyways here is a list of tips for battle that you should keep in mind:

NOTE: This is really meant for single player. Humans are smarter and less
predictable so they may see through some of these tricks and such.

-Always keep a balanced force. MTW is like any real time strategy in that it
uses a kind of rock-paper-scissors system. (You need spearmen to kill cavalry, cavalry to kill bowman, etc.).

-Fear is contagious. Routing units scare nearby allied troops.

-Do not have a king in a territory that will have a battle since the king will
always become the general even if he has only 1 command compared to another general in the same territory with 9.

-Do not charge troops until the last minute since it saves energy.

-Select all your units if there is a mass rout and see if it is possible to
rally any of them.

-When on defense take the highest ground possible.

-When on defense you have to choose whether or not to be close to the edge of the map or far away. I usually suggest being close to the edge since it makes enemies have to walk a very long way so they get tired. They also will have to walk through routing units. My troops also get more rest too. The downside to this is that if your units rout close to the map edge you have almost no chance of rallying them.

-If a unit is out of ammo or become useless for some reason (fatigue,
casualties, etc.) don’t be afraid to right-click them and hit “Withdraw from
Battle”. Unlike rout, this won’t scare your own units and you can still use
this unit later on in the campaign.

-Don’t be afraid to use large group formations. Experiment with them and
conclude on how they are best used (PC Gamer’s December 2002 issue has a great section on the use of group formations).

-Use the strength of your army. (If you have tons of archers try to have them
use all their ammo before you attack with the rest).

-Units suffer penalties the more tired they are and the more surrounded they
are.

-Flanking is your best friend. You can even defeat a group of pikemen with
cavalry if you charge from the back for side.

-Calvary is key since mobility is key to winning battles.

-Make sure a siege weapon has enough crew to fire before you put it into
battle.

-if a battle is so close that you are running low on guys don’t feel bad about
charging units with missile units (although it is usually best to do this
against other weak units like missile units.

-Try and sneak around a horse or two to take out siege weapons.

-Ballistas suck.

-Be wary of turning your guys around while they are fighting. Getting attacked from behind may cause them to route.

-Guard your missile units.

-Bridge battles are the hardest battles in the game. Make sure you have at
least 3x as many guys if attacking.

-Hashinin can give the enemy quite a surprise.

-Siege weapons aren’t just for castles .

-Kill enemy generals since they’ll take a morale hit.

-Use trees to conceal troops.

-Use trees to protect from cavalry and arrows.

-If a multifunction battle starts let the enemy either come to you or fight it
out between themselves, then sweep in for the kill.

-Be a sore loser. Kill prisoners if your going to lose.

-Swap reinforcements until you find the best combination for the start of the
battle.

-Peasants and units with low valor/morale can actually be harmful to your
armies. Be wary of using them since they rout easily. This can cause the fear
to spread to your good troops.

-Use the weather to your advantage. If you are attacking a group of many
archers/gunpowder units attack in rain.

-Try not to send your general to the front.

-Use wedge formations and charges to break enemy formations.

-If a unit works best in deep formations keep them in deep formations.

-If the battle contains more than just two factions than let the other two
fight it out while you hide in the corner. Then come in for the kill when they
are both near death.

-Press ‘P’ so you can pause the game and give orders better.

-If the enemy has a lot of anti-cavalry you should dismount your cavalry.

-Don’t underestimate the power of weapons that cause fear. Even if your siege weapon only kills a few guys it is still scaring the enemy.

-Don’t underestimate short range units like Spanish Jinets and Naptha Throwers.
These units can destroy waves of men. The key to their success is to put them
on hold position and turn off the skirmish mode so they don’t run away and
interrupt their loading every time the enemy takes a step.

-Don’t overload on artillery.

-When placing a siege weapon notice where that siege weapon is able to fire
since it cannot be moved once the battle commences.

-When attacking a castle you have two options. One is too surround the castle
and the other is to focus on one part. The advantage to surrounding is that you confuse the enemy but you get hit by all of the towers in the castle. The focus method is more predictable but you are only hit by half the castles towers.

Charging
……..

Choosing to charge after a fleeing enemy is a risky thing to do. This is
because it tires your troops and it could possibly be a trap. The advantages
are that you will kill many more people, most likely prevent them from
rallying, and also your troops/cavalry will probably gain valor. Even if you
don’t think the computer is clever doesn’t mean that it can’t spring a trap on
you. The computer may be able to rally its troops around and crush yours. It is even worse if you chase all their troops to the end of the map only to find
that they have tons of reinforcements popping in. Your troops will be ripe for
the pickings after they just exhausted themselves with all that chasing.
Generally don’t charge unless you know the computer has no more units in
reserve.

Faction Suggestions (Early Age)
——————————-

Almohads- Somewhat easy. Make use of their special unit as soon as possible.
The only real decision you have to make is whether to attack Egypt or Spain.

Byzantines- Fairly easy. Focus on one front, work towards kataphraktoi, while
building Byzantine infantry, spearmen, archers, and naptha throwers. Try to
start trading early on.

Danes- Oddly enough the Danes are ranked amongst the best factions by many
players. The Danes are moderately hard and they should concentrate on capturing
Norway and terrorizing the North Sea. You could also try to find a weakness in
the Germans or try taking Russia.

Egypt- Egypt is the easiest of the Muslim factions. Egypt is an excellent
territory, they can easily trade, and they have a few good unique units. Focus
on capturing the coastal provinces to the east such as Antioch. Trade there is
great.

English- Most newbies decide to play as English their first time. England is
rather complex for a beginner so I would not recommend it for the first try.
They are trapped by France though they do have excellent unique and province
only units.

French- The French are relatively easy. They are great at crusading and are only
rivaled by Germany in the knight department. I would suggest crusading for a
while until you no longer care about being excommunicated. Take Switzerland
ASAP since the pikemen and halberdiers are excellent.

Germany- The strategy here…pure and utter war. kill anyone you want and work
towards the high level knights. Take Switzerland ASAP. Germany is the only
country that can fight a war on all fronts with relative ease.

Italy- One of my personal favorites. Italy should specialize in trade and
become a monetary powerhouse. Whether or not you choose to get rid of the
Papacy is up to you. I recommend a mix of The Moving Wall with Wealth Beyond
Measure with a heavy emphasis on Italian Infantry.

Polish- These are the real underdogs of the early age. They are surrounded and
have no special units of any use. I would suggest taking over Russia or
Byzantines first.

Spanish- Crusades are the name of the game here. Take out the Almohads or the
Byzantines and build a lot of Spanish Jinets since they are very versatile.

Turkish- Competing with the Polish for the worst faction of the time. The Turks
have some ok unique units but other than that they have no other advantages.

Legal Stuff
———–

This document is copyright 2002 by Layne Phillips, the sole owner of this
document. This document is protected by international copyright laws. If you
wish to publish or post this document somewhere you must have my express
permission.

GUILD WARS GAME GUIDE

GUILD WARS GAME GUIDE

By Matthew Rorie
Design by Collin Oguro
So far as PC games go, few titles in 2005 have generated as much buzz as Guild Wars has. This online-only multiplayer game incorporated MMORPG elements into a fast-paced, skill-based, combat-focused game that plays as something of a nouveau Diablo II, with some stunning graphics and addictive gameplay. In it, players will have to team up to overcome the vicious forces that wish to overwhelm the human kingdoms of Tyria, and fight their way from the blasted lands of Ascalon in the east over the mountains that block their passage to the western kingdoms of Kryta. Along the way, they’ll chop through thousands of Charr, evil dwarves, golems, and undead foes, all in the hopes of eventually passing through the Ascension and taking their rightful place in the Hall of Heroes, where they’ll battle for dominance in an eternal war. Fun!
GameSpot’s Game Guide to Guild Wars serves as something of an entry-level guide to starting out in the world of Tyria. We’re going to describe the basics of each class, run down how best to start your character’s adventures, give you tips on crafting new items, and share some of our PVP experiences with you. Enjoy!
Classes
Warrior
Warriors are somewhat unique in the world of Ascalon, as they’re one of the only classes that can be reliably counted on in toe-to-toe combat. Every other class in the game is going to be attempting to stay away from enemies, for the most part, due to their focus on ranged spells and weapons and poor armor stats, but as a Warrior, you’re going to be expected to get toe-to-toe with your foes and wail on them with an axe, sword, or hammer. To that end, you’re going to be able to wield much thicker armor than other classes will, and will possess more health as well.
The prototypical Warrior secondary profession is Monk, which offers you up a number of healing spells which can let you quickly restore your health when you’re under the brunt of an enemy assault. Healing Wave, especially, is a relatively cheap (10 Energy) and quick-casting spell that can offer up a good amount of health regeneration, while later spells like Mending will let you trade in some of your Energy restoration for a constant amount of health restoration. The negative side of being a Monk is that you can sometimes find yourself with spells that you won’t use too often when you group up with an excellent primary Monk, since they’ll be healing you as best they cane, but your skills will serve as a useful backup in case you get overwhelmed.
Other useful secondary professions include Ranger, which can give you another useful healing spell in Troll Ungeunt and allow you to tame a wild beast to act as a secondary source of damage, and Necromancer, which offers a number of ways to restore your health, often while damaging enemies, as with spells like Life Siphon, Vampiric Gaze, and Vampiric Touch. There’s a common theme here: as a Warrior, you’ll likely want to grab a secondary class that can offer you some way to restore your own health. You know, just in case. Classes like Mesmer and Elementalist are therefore somewhat odd choices as a secondary class, if only because they lack a large number of relevant self-buffs and are also somewhat energy intensive.

Warriors are expected to get down and dirty by entering into melee combat with their enemies.
The primary drawback of the warrior is his or her inability to quickly regenerate energy, and their overall lack of a large energy pool. Since Elementalists, Monks, and the like will usually gain bonuses to energy regeneration from equipment, and Warriors usually won’t, they’ll be held to the default two points of energy regeneration for quite a while, meaning that it’ll be more difficult for them to build energy back up during a fight. Their smaller energy pool will also restrict them in their use of high-cost powers, meaning that Warriors will have to choose a secondary profession with care, lest they wind up with something that offers powerful but high-cost abilities that can only be used a few times before they run dry of mana.
Luckily, Warriors aren’t required to use Energy for many of their own skills, and those that do use energy will rarely take more than five energy at a shot. Instead, they siphon their own adrenaline during battle and use that to power their attacks. Adrenaline can be built up at a rate of one point per successful strike in battle, but you won’t get a real numerical readout of your adrenaline reserves during combat; instead, your adrenaline-using skills will gradually light up from their normal blackened state as you hit things, and when you have enough adrenaline to use an ability (you can check the amount required on your skills window), they’ll light up completely, signifying that they’re ready to go. Many of the weapons-based skills will add status effects or have non-damaging effects on enemies, such as Bleeding, Deep Wounds, or knockdown. You can use them to vary up the pure-damage capabilities of the warrior a bit.
One thing to mind as a warrior is your aggro radius. You’ll notice that there’s a little white circle around your character on your compass in the upper-right corner of the screen; this indicates the distance at which enemies will notice you and start attacking. Since Warriors are often going to have to approach enemies, due to the fact that they use melee weapons, you’ll need to be very, very careful that you don’t accidentally aggravate more than one enemy group at a time. You might be able to survive such an encounter, but you need to recall that there are a bunch of teammates behind you that are very dependent on their energy to survive, since they have less health and armor than you do; taking on large groups of enemies when you could separate them out into smaller chunks isn’t a good idea if you care about your teammates. And you do care, don’t you?
Strength
Strength is the primary skill of the Warrior, and thus isn’t available to characters that take Warrior as a secondary class. Each point allocated here will allow your weapon strikes to ignore one percent of your opponent’s armor, and will also affect some of the appropriately strength-requiring skills, such as Power Attack.
Swordsmanship
Swordsmanship increases the damage you deal with swords, and also increases the likelihood of striking for a critical hit when you do land a blow with a sword. It’ll also increase the efficacy of your sword-based skills, like Sever Artery and Gash. Swords are exclusively one-handed, and deal less damage than hammers, but can be used with a shield.
Axe Mastery
Axe Mastery focuses around the art of wielding axes, increasing the damage from those weapons and upping the likelihood of a critical hit. Axes are generally going to have the lowest normal damage of melee weapons, and will rely on their adrenaline skills to compensate for this.
Hammer Mastery
Hammer Mastery, like the other two weapons-based skills, will boost the damage and critical chance of hammers. Hammers are always going to be two-handed, meaning that you’ll have to forgo the use of a shield while dealing damage, but you’re going to get higher damage in return.
Tactics
Tactics increases the efficacy of a Warrior’s Shouts and other support abilities. Shouts are primarily used to give a short-lived buff to the entire party at the cost of adrenaline or Energy, although some shouts will only work on the Warrior that casts them.
Monk
Monks often fit into the healing archetype that’s such an integral part of any party-based online combat system, and indeed can fulfill this role quite well; Monks are often going to be a required component in any cooperative mission, since they can quickly and ably heal teammates to counter the effects of incoming damage.
In addition to pure healing skills, though, of which there are many, Monks can also use Smiting magic and Protection spells. Smiting magic is often going to be a Monk’s sole offensive ability; these skills will usually deal Holy damage to enemies, which is especially handy against undead foes, which take double damage from Holy spells. You won’t be dealing as much damage as a good Elementalist in most situations, but you’ll at least have something to whip out when all of your teammates are well-healed. Protection spells are generally going to be buffs, in that you cast them on your teammates and they get the benefit of your spell, such as increased defense or blocking abilities, for a short duration.
The primary drawback of Monks is their low health total and poor armor, at least in comparison to some of the other, beefier classes, like Rangers and Warriors. Still, with the self-healing abilities of Healing Wave and Orison of Healing, this is rarely a drawback. It’s also somewhat difficult to solo as a pure healing Monk. You can grab a Warrior Henchmen, which are surprisingly durable thanks to their own self-healing capabilities, but you’ll always have a problem with pure damage dealing unless you pick up a good secondary class and allocate some skill points to pumping up damage. Mesmer is a popular secondary choice, as its Domination tree will let you lay down spells that will affect enemies over time without overly taxing your energy. You can also go with Elementalism if you wish, but many of the most effective spells there will take a lot of energy, and if you start to fall behind on the healing because you’re going for offensive abilities, you can expect to annoy your (probably dead) teammates a great deal.
Divine Favor
Divine Favor is your primary skill, and is mostly going to be of use to Healing monks. Each point here will result in a blanket three health being restored whenever you cast a spell. For instance, if you have one point in Divine Favor and cast Heal Other on a teammate, they’ll be gained for three health plus whatever Heal Other gave them. If you have five points in Divine Favor, then they’ll gain 15 points of health, plus whatever Heal Other gives them. So it stacks with healing powers, but also works with non-healing abilities like Shielding Hands. Healing / Protection monks will want to emphasize their Healing attribute, but Divine Favor should be close behind.
In addition to adding a blanket healing bonus to your spells, there are also a few skills that are specifically tied to Divine Favor for increasing their effects, but it’s a small and rather unremarkable bunch.
Healing Prayers

The perfect spot for a Monk: back in the back of a group, healing from behind.
The Monk is the only class in the game that can heal other players in the party, save for some very limited abilities of the Necromancer and the Ranger; all classes get some way to heal themselves, but when you want a real healer, you’re going to pick a Monk to round out the ranks of your party. Most Monks will, indeed, probably want to specialize in Healing prayers, as healing monks are in great demand for partying, especially when you get up to around Piken Square or so. The more points you put into your Healing attribute, the more effective your spells will be – it’s as simple as that.
Smiting Prayers
The Smiting attribute is the school of offensive power for Monks, and mostly focuses around causing Holy damage to foes. Holy damage is a useful tool, especially when dealing with ghosts and the Undead that start popping up later in the game, but the sad fact of it is that most Monks aren’t going to be chosen for their offensive prowess, and if you advertise yourself as a smiting Monk, you’ll rarely be chosen in front of a Monk that can actually heal worth a damn, except perhaps when you start dealing with the Undead. Investing heavily in Smiting will prevent you from becoming too good at Healing, which is what most parties desire, although it will make you a bit more feasible while soloing.
Protection Prayers
Protection prayers are focused on preventing damage from reaching your allies and removing negative effects and hexes from them. There are some pretty neat spells in here, such as Shielding Hands, which will reduce all of the damage an opponent takes for the next ten seconds, and Vital Blessing, which is an enchantment that will boost a single ally’s maximum health while you maintain it. Shielding Hands alone is probably worth investing a few points into Protection for, as it’s great to cast on a character that’s about to charge into a group of enemies, or that’s getting pounded on too quickly for you to heal them.
Ranger
Almost all of the classes in Guild Wars have access to ranged or magical attacks, and good ones at that, making the Ranger perhaps less of a unique class than the Hunter in World of Warcraft or the Amazon in Diablo II is. But it’s still the only boat to row if you want to use skills that boost your bow attacks, and is also the only class that will let you set traps and tame animals to serve at your side.
One of the distinguishing features of the Ranger is that they can use their bow attacks from a good distance away, further in fact than most spellcasters will be able to hit you from. In party combat, this can make you a valuable puller, as you’ll be able to position yourself behind your warrior, select a target, shout it out, then fire at it to pull it and its group towards you. With some help from a healer, you can easily survive the aggro generation of such a maneuver, and you’ll be able to front-load your damage with things like Precision Shot, Power Shot, and preparation abilities like Apply Poison or Choking Gas, or lay down a trap between you and the opposing enemies and force them to run over it on their way to you.
One thing to remember as a Ranger is that you’re going to be dealing a bit more damage if you’re above your enemies. You gain a damage bonus from having the high ground, which is especially useful in PVP, so do your best to get above your enemies and fire down at them.
A number of professions mesh well with the Ranger. Ranger/Mesmers or Ranger/Necros can be devastating in PVP thanks to their ability to stack poison and health degeneration effects on a single target, or otherwise gimp foes with status effects, while Ranger/Monks offer up a number of support abilities to help your team carry the day in mortal combat.
Expertise
Expertise reduces the overall energy cost of most of your skills, with each extra point in Expertise resulting in a 4% reduction of energy costs for Preparation, Traps, and Attack skills. Note that this benefit doesn’t round up, so you’ll need to pump this enough to get a full energy point reduction in order to see any effect. E.g. an applicable skill that costs 10 Energy won’t get any benefit from two points in Expertise, since this is only an 8% reduction, and thus amounts to less to a point; putting another point in Expertise, however, will result in a 12% reduction, and will thus drop the energy cost of the skill to nine points.
Expertise also affects skills that reduce Energy cost, skill recharge times, and your Ranger’s chance to dodge attacks, such as Practiced Stance, Lightning Reflexes, and Dodge.
Beast Mastery
The Beast Mastery skill tree mostly revolves around buffing your animal companion, increasing its health recovery rate or armor or giving it added offensive capabilities. There are plenty of Call abilities, which generally last for 30 or 60 seconds, allowing you to put them up just before a fight starts and have them last throughout. There are also a number of skills here that affect Rangers themselves, allowing them to adopt the aspect of a certain beast for a short period of time, and which act as short-term self-buffs.
Marksmanship
Marksmanship skills revolve around increasing the efficacy and especially the speed of your bow attacks. Not many of these skills will result in outright damage increases, but many of them will let you fire more quickly, thus letting you pump out more damage per second. A lot of these skills will also let you interrupt enemy actions, forcing them to start casting their spell or performing that action again. Marksmanship rangers can thus be pretty annoying in PVP.
Wilderness Survival
Most of a Ranger’s trap abilities are located in Wilderness Survival, along with the bulk of their Preparation abilities. Traps are great ways to start off fights, as they’ll affect multiple enemies with status effects, as well as causing damage, while Preparation skills will allow you to add damage or an effect to all of your ranged attacks for the next dozen seconds or so.
Elementalist
As in many MMO’s, the Elementalist (read: Mage) in Guild Wars is going to be the heavy damage dealer of the party, with many of the most damaging spells, area-of-effect attacks, and elemental damage. While physically weak, elementalists get large energy reservoirs and plenty of energy restoration to go along with it, enabling them to cast plenty of spells with minimal downtimes.
As the name of the class implies, Elementalists are masters of elemental magic, in this case subdivided into Air, Fire, Earth, and Water. This is something of a drawback, as the four divisions of magic, when added to the Energy Storage primary power, mean that Elementalists have to choose from five attributes instead of four, thus meaning that each attribute will have somewhat fewer spells available to it than you’d find in other classes. Still, though, each attribute is going to be roughly equivalent to one another, with each having its own strengths and weaknesses.
Like in most games with elemental magic, you’re going to find that some enemies are going to be weaker to some forms of magic than others, especially when the foes you’re facing are themselves constructed out of an element. So, for instance, if you see an Ice Elemental running around, you’d be wise to use Fire magic on it; any Fire spells you use will do double damage. Using Ice magic on an Ice Elemental, however, will result in drastically lower damage than normal. Since it costs an awful lot of points to reach the higher level of an elemental skill, you’re probably going to want to try and specialize as much as you can in a single school of magic, and use your secondary profession to deal damage or otherwise hurt enemies that wind up being resistant to your elemental prowess. You can still realign your attributes when you reach an area where you think it’d be worthwhile to do so, such as by retasking to fire magic when you hit the snowy peaks around Yak’s Bend.
The most popular secondary profession for Elementalists seems to be Mesmerism, with its wide array of support abilities that mesh well with Elementalism. Things like Backfire can be a big help when dealing with spellcasters, since it’ll harm them each time they cast a spell, while Phantasm can add some straight bleeding to their rear ends. Domination Mesmers can especially be nice, since they’re quick to cast and affect an enemy for a few seconds at a time. Monking can also be popular so that you can act as a secondary healer when needed, but you need to be careful not to spend too much energy on healing; most of what you want to be doing in combat is casting spells.
Energy Storage
Energy Storage is going to be a great skill to invest in, especially over the first few points, as each point will net you an extra three maximum energy. There are a lot of classes that would die for this kind of simple boon, but the Elementalist is arguably the one in most need of it, since they have the most expensive spells and need to cast spells to fulfill their role as a damage dealer. Some spells require upwards of 40 energy to cast, so you’ll probably need a couple of points in Energy Storage just to use them, barring excellent equipment upgrades.
Fire Magic

A good fire Elementalist is a valuable asset in any battle.
Fire magic is obviously going to be best used against ice and snow creatures, but can be devastating against almost any enemy you face. Fire has a good mixture of single-target and area-of-effect spells, and can often set enemies on fire, resulting in extra damage over time. It is, however, an expensive school of magic, with many skills that cost 15 or 25 energy at a go.
Water Magic
Water magic incorporates both water and ice magics, resulting in a school that emphasizes slowing enemies and protecting you from harm. The damage here isn’t as great as Fire magics are, but there are some noticeably good spells, such as Blurred Vision, which can cause all enemies in a group to miss with 50% of their attacks for 10-20 seconds. This is a great spell to open a fight with.
Earth Magic
Earth Magic focuses on knocking enemies down, and is especially useful for damaging enemies close to the caster and for increasing your resistance to physical attacks. Although it doesn’t have quite as much offensive prowess as something like Fire does, Earth is notable for the relative cheapness of its spells, with most coming in at 10 energy or so.
Air Magic
Air magic doesn’t have a particular effect associated with it; many of the spells just do good solid damage and leave it at that. It’s also generally going to be the cheapest school of magic to specialize in, with only one 25-energy spell and no 40’s at all.
Mesmer
Mesmers are manipulators, not focused on dealing outright damage, but rather with throwing out status ailments and twisting the efforts of their enemies back on themselves. It isn’t an exceedingly popular choice as a primary profession, but is quite often seen backing up primary monks and elementalists on their journeys.
Mesmers have a bevy of manipulative spells at their disposal, and are especially useful at negating the powers of enemy spellcasters or at manipulating the raw energy of foes so that they can’t access their skills and spells. There aren’t a great number of super-awesome-DragonBallZ offensive powers here, but with practice, you can be quite annoying in combat.
As a Mesmer, you’re going to want to pack along another spell-casting secondary class, such as Monk or Elementalist, to compensate for your lack of a purely defined role. Your Fast Casting attribute can supplement these abilities by allowing you to pump out damage or healing spells more quickly than primary Monks or Elementalists would be able to. Mesmer/Necros are especially deadly when dealing with single targets, as Conjure Phantasm combined with something like Blood Siphon or Faintheartedness can stack for massive health degeneration for a short duration, forcing enemy healers to work overtime to counteract the effects.
Oddly enough, although Mesmers is one of the least utile classes in PVE play, a well-played Mesmer can be devastating in PVP combat. If you can get close enough to your foes to cast a well-timed Chaos Storm or Backfire on their primary casters or Monks, you can shut them down for a good amount of time, or force them to cease casting until they can remove your hex. The tough part is going to be getting close enough to the back lines of your enemies to cast your stuff, since it’ll typically be the warriors going in headfirst. Try to have your target lined up before the melee begins, though, and just run through the fight to cast your hexes; mesmers are usually a low-priority target for the opposing team, so you won’t likely be getting hit too often.
Fast Casting
Fast Casting is the Mesmer’s primary skill, and, well, lets you cast your skills a bit more quickly than you would otherwise. This skill doesn’t list a set percentage bonus for casting times, so it’s difficult to gauge its precise effect, and it’s also difficult to know whether it rounds up or down, which is important for spells that already have a short casting time. Anyway, dump points here if you’re looking to put more magic in the air, but be careful not to cast too fast or you’ll run out of energy.
Domination
Domination mostly focuses on harrassing and interrupting enemy spellcasters. There are a number of powerful spells in this category, with two of our favorites being Backfire and Chaos Storm. Backfire is a single-target spell that hexes a single spellcaster for ten seconds; whenever that character casts a spell during that timeframe, he or she will take damage. If you pump up your Domination stat almost all the way, you can bump the damage up to over 100 points per spell, which is sometimes enough to kill enemies outright if they’re not careful. This is especially useful on enemy Monks in PVP, since they have to constantly cast healing spells on everyone else. They’ll either have to stop healing their teammates, or waste their energy on healing themselves.
Chaos Storm is another damaging spell, but one that affects a character and the area around them. In PVE play, you’ll often come up against masses of enemies that stick close together; a Chaos Storm cast on one of them will deal a bit of damage every second for ten seconds to all enemies near your target, and also drain energy from spellcasting enemies when they cast a spell. Although you need to have a large number of attribute points in Domination to drain more than a couple points of energy with each hit, Chaos Storm is still pretty useful at any stage, as it’ll cause your enemies to both take damage and lose energy.
If you’re looking for a more straightforward version of Chaos Storm, you may want to try out Energy Burn. This skill starts out by draining your foe for 5 energy and dealing eight times that amount in health damage, but you can up the amount of energy lost by, again, increasing your Domination stat.
Illusion
Illusion magic is mostly intended to affect your opponent’s minds, mostly by disrupting their attacks and throwing out numerous other status effects. There are some damage spells in here, mostly of the “target players loses X health per second” variety.
Inspiration
Inspiration skills typically revolve around the manipulation of energy, mostly by stealing the energy of enemies and transferring it to yourself, or adding energy cost to normal actions, such as attacking. Some of the skills here also revolve around manipulating the enchantments of enemy spellcasters, such as by removing them from the targets, allowing you to eliminate the buffs on certain characters.
Necromancer
Necromancers are the dark magicians of Guild Wars, focused on manipulating the powers of blood and death to their own nefarious ends. Strong necromancers can be a mighty asset to a party, as they have the ability to summon armies of mindless drones to distract foes and can convert bodies into extra health regeneration, or sacrifice their own life for added benefits. They also have plenty of skills revolving around the transferance of conditions, such as Bleeding or Deep Wounds, allowing them to transfer negative effects on themselves over to enemies.

A Death Magic Necromancer can pop up plenty of Bone Horrors to help a group in PVE.
Necromancers function as something of indirect damage dealers in PVE combat, with a number of support abilities that can help your entire party. Since they don’t have an overwhelming number of direct damage spells, many Necromancers choose to take on Warrior as a secondary profession and use melee weapons in combat, relying on Blood Magic abilities to restore their health and afflict their enemies. Although this archetype is fairly common, many players also love grouping with Death Magic Necromancers, especially when you’re questing in areas with large numbers of flesh targets, such as evil dwarves and Charr. Death Magicians can raise armies of the undead from corpses, which will take gradual damage until they die, but which will reduce the pressure on your healers and front-line troops by giving your enemies a number of essentially meaningless targets to beat on.
In PVP, the Necromancer’s role is somewhat different. Since you can’t rely on a steady stream of corpses, corpse-affecting spells are vastly reduced in effectiveness. However, you should have plenty of Blood Magic and Curse effects to spread the horror with; things like Faintheartedness, Enfeebling Blood, Shadow of Fear, and the like can all greatly reduce the effectiveness of specific enemies or enemy groups. And although you won’t be able to raise undead armies, you may wish to examine the Well powers, such as Well of Suffering or Well of Blood. While you do need to kill an enemy before you can use these spells, they can effect drastic shifts in the balance of power, either by giving all of your teammates a good deal of health regeneration for around ten seconds or by afflicting all of your enemies with health degeneration. Also, don’t overlook the spells that strip enemies of Enchantments, such as Chilblains and Strip Enchantment; most Warrior/Monks will be laying down Retribution or Mending on themselves which you’ll be happy to be rid of, and you’ll also be able to strip away a Monk’s Healing Breeze if you’re quick.
As mentioned, many Necromancers in the game take Warrior as a secondary profession, although this is far from a consensus choice. Necro/Elementalist and Necro/Mesmer are also popular choices, with Necro/Ranger and Necro/Monk being somewhat less common. With Soul Reaping, though, you should be able to fuel most spellcasting classes with the energy that you steal from enemies, so energy conservation isn’t quite as pressing an issue as it is for, say, a primary Mesmer.
Soul Reaping
For each point you put into Soul Reaping, you’ll gain one energy when a nearby enemy dies. Pretty handy, that, especially in large-scale PVE battles where you’ll be mowing down enemies quickly. It’s not quite as useful in PVP combat, though, where kills are going to obtained only after long slogs of fighting, and where your victory is usually almost assured after the first couple of kills, making the extra energy gained less than necessary.
Curses
Curses is a good support attribute for PVP players, as you’ll be able to harry your opponents with slowing, interruptions, Hexes, and all kinds of nasty stuff like that. A number of the spells here will reduce the effectiveness of healing magic cast on your target for a period of time, allowing you to plop them down on an enemy warrior and go to town – just be sure your teammates know who you’re casting on so that they can all target him or her.
Blood Magic
Blood Magic often involves some kind of sacrifice of the Necromancer’s health to effect some kind of change on the target. A good early spell that Necrowarriors and Warrior/Necros will want to boost is Blood Renewal, which forces you to sacrifice 33% of your health, then nets you three health regeneration for ten seconds and a large health gain at the end of the spell. If you can get a Monk to cast Healing Breeze on you while you cast this spell, you’ll be able to charge in with as much as 10 or 11 health regeneration, making you virtually undamagable for 10 seconds. Generally, though, it’s best to cast it before combat, then take advantage of the regeneration to charge into combat and start swinging away.
If you happen to have access to them, Well of Blood and especially Well of Power (an elite skill) are great in PVP, since they’ll let your teammates sit inside the radius of their effects and gain regeneration for 10 seconds. They don’t affect your enemies, and these effects can’t be dispelled. Just be sure to let your party members know that you’re casting them!
For PVP, you might also want to try using Spinal Shivers on critical enemies, like healing Monks. It will cause your target to be interrupted when hit by cold damage for a good length of time, up to 30 seconds. If you pair this with a wand that deals cold damage, it’s conceivable that you could prevent an enemy from casting any spells for the duration of the effect, although you yourself would of course be almost useless to your team for the duration of this effect.
Death Magic
Death Magic, as previously mentioned, mostly revolves around the conversion of corpses into usable energy or effects, or with the maintenance of undead allies that you’ve raised. It can be useful in PVP, but you won’t be able to rely on the undead armies of PVE; instead, you’ll be using Death Magic for things like Soul Feast, Putrid Explosion, and Deadly Swarm. In PVE, though, undead masters are a great boon to a team, at least in areas where you can actually raise undead minions. Although they’ll take damage over time and eventually die if you don’t quickly move from enemy to enemy, they still confuse the enemies in the game and cause them to cease attacking the actual members of your team.

Getting Started
When you first step into the world of Tyria, it’ll probably take you a little while to get used to the somewhat odd way the game is set up, especially if you’re attempting to shift over from a “pure” MMO game like World of Warcraft. Things are a little bit different in Guild Wars, mostly in the sense of things being multiplayer, but much less massive. It’s really more akin to Diablo II than anything else, if you happened to play that game, save that the numerous chat channels are incorporated right into the game itself in the form of the towns. Like Diablo II, it’s going to be rare to play with more than a few other people at a time; only in the cities will you meet up with other players and attempt to group up for missions. When you do head out on a mission, the game will create a special zone for you and your party members (or just yourself if you’re playing solo) that will only features enemies in it; no other players outside your group will be able to access it. Thus, your chances of happening across a fellow player out of town and striking up a group will be nil, but likewise, you’re never going to be killed by some griefer who happens to enjoy taking advantage of the weakness of others.
In essence, though, Guild Wars does play a lot like an MMO, or any other type of RPG, since it has skill sets, classes, equipment upgrades, quests; all the trappings of a traditional RPG experience are here. Getting used to the game’s unique mechanics can be a bit daunting, but with a little time under your belt, you should pick up the pace pretty quickly. For those of you who are brand-new to this type of genre, though, we’re going to give you some tips to help get you started in Ascalon.
After Character Creation
After you’ve made a new character and sit through the opening cutscene, you’ll be deposited into Ascalon City, one of the capitals of Tyria. The storyline elements of the game are summed up by the cutscenes you’ll witness as you take quests, as well as in the opening cutscene, so if you’re interested in learning more about what’s happening in Tyria, play close attention; the manual also has a bunch of fiction for the game if you want to read that.

There’s always time to dance nude in Ascalon. Use the /dance command in a chat window to start the boogie.
Anyway, here you are standing around in town. You’ll notice that one of the characters in front of you, the Town Cryer, has a green arrow over his head; this indicates that he has a quest for you. If you talk to him (by left-clicking on him) and accept the quest that he gives, called “Message For a Friend,” it’ll be entered into your quest log, which you can check by hitting L. This is a simple quest; all you have to do to complete it is cross the bridge to your north and speak to Sir Tydus, who likewise has a green arrow above his head (which can also indicate that a character can give you a reward for completing a quest), you’ll complete the initial quest and earn your reward, netting you a little gold and experience. You’re off to a good start!
After you talk to Sir Tydus, he’ll offer you another quest right off the bat. This quest, “War Preparations,” will involve you leaving town, so go ahead and do so. You’re likely going to see a lot of other players in the town square on your way out, but don’t worry about them yet; just walk down the ramp and into the large, glowing, white exit points on your left.
Adventuring and Earning Skills
When you leave town, you’ll see a short loading screen, and you’ll wind up in Lakeside County, an idyllic little area that’s devoid of any serious threats to you. Immediately outside the gates should be Gwen, a young girl, and your first quest trainer, the name of whom will change based on your chosen profession. Your trainer will definitely have a quest for you, and if Gwen’s there, she might have a quest for you as well. (One of the classes, Monks if we recall, actually have a quest to help rescue Gwen, who’s been trapped by monsters nearby, so she won’t be there for those players.)
Speak to your trainer first off. They’ll give you a simple quest to perform, after which they’ll reward you your first two skills. As you accept this quest, you’ll notice a little flair on your compass, in the upper right-hand corner of the screen, which resolves itself into a small green arrow in the corner of your mini-map; this is going to point you towards your quest objective. (If you missed the quest text, you can find it in your quest log and read it again.)
Now, most of these starting quests are going to involve killing Skale, which are goblin-like fish creatures that dwell near the river to the south of your location. Head there and start taking down Skale, then; you should be able to handily defeat them with your starting weapons. Most of these enemies won’t attack you unless you attack first, so you’ll be able to handily avoid combat if you just want to run past them, but you should definitely kill a few of them for experience and to gain some items. All you have to do to attack an enemy is left-click on it; if you want to get a little more complicated, you can use Tab to cycle through nearby enemies, then hit Space when you see a likely target. River Skale Tads are going to be your most likely target here, as they’re level 0 and will be able to take only a few hits before keeling over dead.

You’re going to have plenty of time to practice on the easy enemies before the Searing before moving on to the real challenges in the game.
Most enemies in the game will drop some kind of item when killed, and these Skales are no exception. While enemies never drop usable armor, you may find weapons that are an upgrade over what you were initially given. To check your equipment, hit I and move your mouse over the weapon in your weapon slot; most of them will do something like 3-5 damage. If you’re using a one-handed weapon, like a sword or a cane, you’ll be able to equip another item in the shield slot below it. Warriors will want to put an actual shield here, while spellcasters will want to equip some kind of item that gives you extra energy, such as a chakra or an icon. Pop your inventory whenever you pick up an item and see if it isn’t something you can equip. (Note that many of the Skale will drop Skale Fins; be sure to pick these up.) If any of the items that drop have blue names, hold onto them; these are magical items. You’ll need an Identification Kit to identify them, but you’ll be able to get one of those later on.
When you’ve completed your initial quest given to you by your trainer, return to him or her for your quest reward. You can check on whether or not you’re done by examining the quest in your quest log; underneath the Quest Summary, you should see your objectives scratched out with the line “Return to (trainer) for your reward” entered in beneath it. With that done, return back to the gates of Ascalon City and talk to your trainer again; they’ll give you your first two skills in your primary profession. After that’s done, your trainer will return to the city, leaving Haversan in their place. Haversdan should have a couple of new quests for you, so pick those up.
Skills
Now that you have a couple of skills under your belt, we might explain what these do. Skills are essentially your spells; all classes have them, and all of them will need to use them in combat for maximum effectiveness.
You can collect an incredible number of skills in your travels, with most of them coming as quest rewards, just like you earned these two. You can only use eight skills at a time, though, and you won’t be able to change these eight skills during a mission. If you have more than eight skills (and it won’t take you long to acquire more than that), you’ll need to pick them while in town. You can open your skills menu by hitting K, and if you’re in town, you’ll be able to drag and drop skills onto your skill bar (at the bottom of the screen) to select the eight that you want to use.
If you want to obtain more skills for your character, then Haversdan should have given you a quest called “A New Ranger Trainer” or “A New Warrior Trainer” or whatever. If you follow the arrow given to you on your map (which will likely lead you outside of Lakeside County), you’ll eventually find another trainer for your profession, who’ll give you more quests and more skills. Yay! The more skills you have, the more flexible you’ll be in combat.
Note that most skills will have green numbers in their descriptions, which you can check in the Skills menu or by running your mouse over the skills on your skill bar. These indicate variables, or numbers which can be increased or reduced by allocating attribute points to your various attributes. Don’t worry about them yet; instead, just keep adventuring for the moment and we’ll discuss attributes later on.
Merchants
Now, if you return to Ascalon City, we’ll talk about the merchant characters you’ll encounter there. There are three types of merchants here: general merchants, weapons merchants, and crafters.
General Merchants are given the tag [Merchant], and can be found in pretty much every town in the game. These guys will sell you items, the most important of which are the identification kit and salvage kit. Both of these are described in detail in our Items chapter above, but to sum up: ID kits will let you identify magical items that drop, while salvage kits will let you break down junk items into useful crafting items that you can bring to a crafter to make more powerful equipment.
At the beginning of the game, though, the most important role of the merchant will be as a buyer; you can sell almost anything to him, and although he won’t pay you much more than five gold for most of the stuff you’re going to be finding in the early game, but since you start out with virtually no cash, every little bit will help, and indeed you’ll be finding enough junk items in the game so that the small amounts of cash you earn from item sales will definitely add up.
Weapons Merchants won’t be fully usable for a good long while. At the outset of the game, all they can really do is customize your weapons for you, which adds +20% damage to the weapon at the low cost of ten gold. This is worthwhile in and of itself (although it does prevent you from giving the weapon to another character for them to use), but later in the game, you’ll be able to add custom parts to your weapon to upgrade it further. For now, though, return to the Weapons vendor whenever you get a new weapon and customize it for the extra damage.

The crafter in Ascalon offers terrible merchandise. Save your crafting items until after the Searing.
Crafters are similar to weapons merchants in that they won’t be tremendously useful until later in the game. Again, these are explained in greater detail in the Items chapter above, but for now, suffice to say that you can bring crafting items to these guys and have them convert them into better equipment. Most of the equipment that you can earn in Ascalon is barely worth making, though, so you’re better off not salvaging equipment, and instead just selling everything you can for cash at this point in the game.
Choosing a Secondary Profession
Now, at this point you can start exploring the countryside. If you wish, you can track down the next trainer for your profession, or attempt to earn a secondary profession. You’re going to need to earn a secondary profession before you can leave this first part of the game, so you’re going to want to start thinking about what you want to pick.
Luckily for you, you can feel free to try out multiple professions before settling down and picking one. When you find a secondary profession trainer, of which there’ll be five (one for each profession except your primary profession), they’ll give you a task to perform and loan you some of the skills of that class, which you can keep and try out while you’re on the quest that they give. In most cases, you’re going to be forced to use the skills that they’ve given you in order to pass through whatever quest that you’re tasked with. For instance, the Monk trainer will give you a healing spell, and then ask you to escort a guard through some poisonous water in the catacombs while he retrieves a sacred object. While he’s running through the water, you’ll need to heal both him and yourself, or you’ll die.
Anyway, if you wish, you can feel free to track down the secondary trainers and partake of their quests at no real risk. Each of their quests will net you 250 experience. After you complete their initial quest, you can return to them for the experience reward; they’ll then ask you if you wish to permanently take on their class as a secondary profession. This is a permanent choice and cannot be changed, ever. If you’re hesitant to commit to the secondary profession, just turn them down; you’ll keep the temporary skills you were given until you do another class’s beginning quest. If you want to take up the profession later on, you can simply return to the trainer again and accept the burden at that point.
Mesmer: Lady Althea, at the Actor’s Stage just outside of Ascalon City, will ask you to track down and kill a rogue bull. Find it on your map (it’s quite close to her) and use Conjure Phantasm to off it. You’ll need to use it three or four times; you can’t hurt it very much with physical attacks due to its high armor.
Monk: Brother Mhenlo resides in Ashford Abbey, a town that lies at the end of the road leading southwest from Ascalon City. If you accept his quest, you’ll be asked to escort an Abbey guard into the catacombs in order to retrieve an artifact. The only catch is that there’s poisonous water between you and your goal, so you’ll need to keep using your healing powers on yourself and the monk if you wish to stay alive.

After you nab an animal friend, you’ll be able to bring it along on adventures, and hug it and love it and squeeze it forever.
Ranger: If you’re interested in ranging, then you’ll have to head to Regent Valley to meet up with Master Ranger Nente, who’ll instruct you on the art of obtaining a pet companion. To do so, head to the Melandru statue noted on your map, then use the Charm Animal skill on one of the Melandru Stalkers there to bind it to your will. With that done, return to Nente to become a full-fledged Ranger.
Elementalism: The secondary trainer for Elementalism is difficult to find. Aziure is going to be found near the tower in Wizard’s Folly, which is a zone found to the south of Ashford Abbey. If you happen to have picked up the quest “The Wayward Wizard” in Ascalon City, then that can be used to make your way down to the town of Foible’s Fair, which is right near the border between the lush greenlands and the snowy mountains to the south. The tower you’re looking for is actually in the mountains, to the southwest of Foible’s Fair, and is going to be guarded by level three Ice Elementals, so you may want to bring along a teammate or wait until you’ve gained a couple of levels before heading out.
When you meet up with Elementalist Aziure, she’ll ask you to protect her while she performs some magical ritual thingamabob. She’ll give you a few spells, including Glyph of Lesser Energy and Fire Storm. The basic idea here is to wait for the Ice Elementals that appear to gather around Aziure, then use the Glyph, then use Fire Storm to pound away at the Elementals. They’ll take double damage from the Fire Storm, so it should be able to kill them all relatively easily. While you’re waiting for it to recharge, attack them with normal spells or attacks, and be sure to stay above the 15 energy needed to cast Fire Storm again. When all the Elementals are dead, you can speak to Aziure again to take on Elementalist as a side profession, if you wish.
Necromancer: Necromancer Munne is found just inside the Catacombs, the entrance to which is inside Ashford Abbey. In order to complete her task, you’ll need to use the Animate Bone Horror skill which she gives you to create zombie-like creatures to do your bidding. She wants you to enter the tomb and kill a Nightmare that has been created within, but the path leading to it is blocked off by a number of flame traps. If you enter one of these flame traps, you’ll die, so instead, walk up to the edge of the trap and use the Bone Horror spell to summon a Horror; they’ll usually be summoned within the flame traps, and thus set them off, freeing you to pass by. The Nightmare is level four, but shouldn’t be too difficult to kill if you’re above level two or so and have some manner of healing yourself.
Warrior: To train as a secondary Warrior, talk to Warmaster Grast in Green Hills County, which you can find by following the road leading west out of Ascalon City. He’ll give you some sword skills, as well as a starter sword, and ask you to kill six Grall Invaders that have taken up position on the roads to the southwest. Do so, then return to him to become a full-fledged warrior, if you wish.
Keep Questing!
After you’ve gotten used to how the game plays, you’ll probably still have a bunch of unfinished quests in your logbook. At this point you’ll probably want to go out and do as many of them as you can – each of them will be worth 250 or 500 experience, and most of them will be easily soloable, except maybe for pure healing monks. Each quest may not add a significant amount to your level bar, but getting as much of the experience here before bumping yourself to post-Searing Ascalon will make the going a lot easier for you as opposed to people who leave at the minimum required level.
Moving On
When you think you’ve expended as much energy as you’re willing to do so in Ascalon and its surroundings, it’s time to move on to the next phase of the game. To do so, return to Ascalon City and talk to Tydus, by the gates to the Ascalon Academy. In order to get past him, you’ll need to be at least level three and have two professions, but you’re well advised to wait until you’re at least level five to move on, and the higher the better. You should be able to get up to level seven or eight by doing all of the quests here, which will make for an easier time after the Searing. Keep in mind, again, that this is a permanent change, and that you won’t be able to return to the Ascalon you know once you accept Tydus’ mission.

The first PVP battle in the game is usually a lopsided affair, so prepare to either destroy or be destroyed.
Anyway, the first task Tydus will give you will involve a quick PVP battle, which is somewhat jarring and confusing, since it arrives without any context whatsoever. Apparently each team here is asked to kill the other time; the first team to record nine kills or so will win the battle. Winning or losing has no real effect on you, though, so don’t worry about this part of the mission overmuch.
After the PVP battle, your team of completely random individuals (which the server selects for you; you can’t choose players to join, apparently, although you may try talking to Tydus while you’re in a group and see if that works), you’ll have to fight your way through a cave full of Charr and kill their leader. You’ll have plenty of NPC helpers here, so you shouldn’t have any problems dropping the beasts. When that’s done, you’ll get a rather interesting cutscene that will propel your character two years into the future, into post-Searing Ascalon.
Post-Searing Ascalon
Ascalon after the Searing is a much different beast than the world you knew beforehand. There are a number of new features waiting for you, just in Ascalon City itself, such as Henchmen, materials traders, and other new vendors, such as the skill vendor. The biggest change in post-Searing Ascalon is the inclusion of story-driven Cooperative missions and PVP-based Competitive missions.
Finding a Party
So far as the general game mechanics go, you’ll find that it’s not really possible to just run out into the world and kill monsters by yourself anymore. There are more monsters running around between the towns, and they’re more difficult to kill, so if you go out all by your lonesome you’re going to have a difficult go of it. Henchmen can help finish off some of these quests, but you’re probably going to want to team up with real players for the more difficult ones.

A good party makes the post-Ascalon quests much easier to manage.
The first and probably best way to find good people to group with is to join a guild. There are plenty of guilds running around spamming invites in Ascalon City most of the time, so if you’re just looking for a random guild to join, it’s not too difficult to find one. It might be better, though, to make a guild with friends, either from real life or people you know online, and then schedule times to get together and do your quests. Or, if your guild is sufficiently large, you should be able to find people online whenever you need help. Just be sure to help out people of lower level than you, or you’ll find your own requests for assistance falling on deaf ears.
Another way to polish off quests is to ask for teammates in the general chat of the town nearest to where the quest is resolved. It’s best to ask for teammates for a specific quest, rather than typing out all of the quests you have into the chat window and hoping for tells. Since you can’t link or share quests, it’s just easier to manage if you get strike teams together for one quest, or for all the quests in a zone, then head back to town for your rewards and to sell the loot that you picked up.
Using Henchmen
Henchmen can be fantastic tools to finish off old quests that you never managed to get around to doing, but their weakness lies in their being just that: tools. They’re not particularly brilliant, can’t adapt as quickly as human players can, and won’t be able to bring all the unique skills that a human player might. That said, they still work well enough for dealing with most of the random 500-experience quests that you’ll come across after you pass through the Searing, so long as you don’t expect them to fight all of your battles for you.
You can hire henchmen in any post-Searing town by finding them in the city (they’re always grouped together, so look for four or more green dots clumped around each other), then clicking on them and clicking on the green plus sign in your party window. You can fill out a whole party with henchmen, if you wish, or you can just hire one or two to come along with you.

Henchmen aren’t brilliant, but they can definitely help you polish off some of the easier quests in the game.
Henchmen affect you as would the presence of other real players: experience is split between yourself and them, as is gold, and they’ll also prevent you from obtaining massive amounts of items. Instead of items dropping and being “claimed” by your henchmen, though, as they would be for real players, they just won’t drop. On the plus side, though, all items that do drop will be available for you to pick up.
Luckily, henchmen are bright enough to team up on the same target, so when you pick a target and fire on it, you can expect all of your henchmen to go for the same enemy. (Note that this is sometimes beyond even the abilities of human players…) You can use this concentration of fire to go through your targets in an orderly fashion, taking down enemy healers first, then going for the big guns.
One thing that henchmen are poor at is defending themselves; this isn’t because they’re not aggressive enough, but rather because they’re sometimes too aggressive, especially in the case of enemies that can’t really be hit. This is mostly a nuisance in areas where enemies are above or below you, such as when you cross a bridge or come up to a cliff; the enemies will notice you when you come within their aggro radius, then start using ranged attacks and spells on you, forcing your henchmen to try and find a (usually non-existant) path to the enemies, thus confusing them and diffusing your party. Sometimes you can force them to follow you by just moving ahead, but this is still pretty annoying.
Use Party Targeting
One of the most exasperating aspects of partying with real live humans is the way that very few people, at least in this early portion of the game’s history, know how to use the game’s auto-targeting system to combine their fire on one target. If you have six people in your party and are trying to take on an opposing group of eight enemies, then you need to have all of your party members targeting the same target. If you do so, you can kill individual enemies in seconds, then move on to the next target, and so on. If, on the other hand, each member of your party is aiming at their own separate targets, then it’ll take you much, much longer to kill things, and you stand a greater chance of seeing your targets get healing from an enemy spellcaster. This isn’t a game of niceties: gang up on a single target, kill it, then move on to the next.
The real bummer about most people’s inability or refusal to use targeting is that it’s incredibly easy to put it to use. All you need to do is select one person in your party to be the designated targeter. This is usually going to be one of your Warriors, since they’ll be in the thick of things and will be able to cycle through targets quickly and will hopefully be able to go for any targets of interest, such as healers or spellcasters. When your targeter has a target lined up, they can let everyone else in the party know who they’re targeting by hitting Ctrl – Space. This will result in a shout in the Team channel (e.g. “St. Augustine: I’m attacking Whiptail Devourer!”) and will pop up a little targeting icon by the name of the targeter in the Party window.

Good party targetting makes coordinating your attacks in PVP much easier.
Now, when you see that your targeter has selected a target and has shouted it out, all you have to do to combine your firepower on that target is hit T, and you’ll automatically target it and open fire with your bow or staff or melee weapon. See? That’s easy, isn’t it? Trust us when we say that proper use of targeting will greatly increase your efficiency in party-based combat, by channeling the firepower of your entire team onto one target. Without party targeting, your party’s damage will be diffused throughout a group of enemies, thus resulting in longer fights and a greater chance that your casters will run out of energy. And that’s not a good thing.
Of course, you don’t always have to use party targeting. Elementalists and other classes with area-of-effect powers might want to switch away from the targeted enemy when using an area-of-effect spell. For instance, if your warrior has targeted an enemy warrior-type foe that he’s going toe-to-toe with, while a larger group of enemies is clustered together behind him, you may want to bust out with your Fire Storm or Chaos Storm on the tighter group of enemies, since you’ll be doing more net damage with those spells back there. Just be sure to switch back to the primary target when you start chucking out energy balls from your weapon.
Obtaining New Skills
One of the primary reasons for playing the PVE game is to acquire new skills which will let you dominate the battlefield when you finally reach level 20 and start to play PVP games against other high-level players. As you travel, then, you’ll want to obtain as many new skills as possible, and there are a few diffeent ways to do so.
Quests: As in pre-Searing Ascalon, many of the skills that you’re going to be obtaining will be available as the result of questing. Get every quest you possibly can, then, and check their quest descriptions to see if they’re going to result in any new skills for your character; different classes will get skill rewards for different quests, depending on the profession of the character that gives the quest. The bulk of your skills will be coming as a result of questing, so be sure to be extra careful to check each quest for new skills listed among the rewards, and do them as soon as you’re able to.
Skill Vendors: Many towns feature NPCs that sell skills to you. In order to obtain them, you’ll need to give them gold, as well as relinquish a Skill Point. Skill Points are earned by obtaining experience, but only very slowly; you also gain them as a resulting of completing the many Cooperative Missions in the game. The important thing to remember about skill vendors is that skills will become more expensive to buy as you buy more of them; the first costs 10 gold, the second costs 20, and so on, until you find yourself paying hundreds of gold for each skill. Skill points themselves are fairly scarce over the life of a character, so don’t bother buying every skill available to you at a vendor, unless you’re a completionist. Rather, it’s best to just purchase the ones you’re absolutely sure that you’re going to use on a regular basis, and leave the rest behind to ensure that you’ll have enough gold and skill points to buy the critical skills later on.
Signet of Capture: The Signet of Capture can be bought from skill vendors in Quarrel Falls and the Henge of Denravi, and can be used to obtain skills directly from enemies. In order to use it, you’ll have to equip it as a normal skill, then find a boss creature that’s using a skill from one of your two professions. After the boss uses a skill that you’d like to obtain, click on the Signet of Capture to steal the skill from the boss; at this point, the Signet will be removed from your skill bar (permanently) and replaced by the stolen skill. You can cancel this capturing procedure if you click on the Signet again, if you find that you’re capturing something you don’t really care for.
The Signet of Capture is unique because it will let you access Elite skills. Elite skills are rare skills that are almost exclusively available through the Signet of Capture. They’re not always incredible improvements over the common skills that you’ll run across, but in most cases they will be upgrades, so if you’re interested in getting the upper hand in PVP you’ll definitely want to try and track them down.
Cooperative Missions
There are a number of Cooperative Missions in post-Searing Ascalon, starting at the Great Northern Wall, which is adjacent to Ascalon City itself. Cooperative missions will require a group of four to eight players to complete, and will usually take anywhere from half an hour to an hour of time. This are objective-based missions, much like the ones ordinarily given to you by NPCs, but a bit more in-depth and detailed. The rewards are greater, as well, with each mission being worth 1,000 experience and a single skill point, which you can use at a skill vendor to purchase new abilities. In addition to the main quest, each cooperative mission will have a Bonus quest associated with it. Finishing the Bonus quest will net you another 1,000 experience, so it’s well worth the time to track them down and finish them off.
The best thing about cooperative missions is that they’ll often end by warping your party to a new town, and sometimes right to the next cooperative mission zone.
We’re not going to be able to give you details on all of the cooperative missions – most of them are fairly straightforward hack-n-slashes anyway – but we are going to include mini-walkthroughs for the first four missions. Completing all of these will take you to Yak’s Bend, the second major town in post-Searing Ascalon.
The Great Northern Wall
The Great Northern Wall is a fairly straightforward kill mission: all you have to do is cut your swath through a number of foes until you reach an outpost a bit north of the wall. Head left when you hit the tarpit and go up the ramps. You’ll know you’re there when you cut down a Charr boss enemy. When you reach the outpost, the mission automatically ends. Congratulations, you just managed to cause the breach of Ascalon’s defensive wall! Way to go!
Bonus: A ghostly warrior is off on the northern end of the mission map. When you find him, he’ll ask you to bring him four pieces of his armor that were lost long ago so that he can gain passage to the afterworld. These armor pieces are scattered around in Wreckage piles around the map, so be sure to hit them all and prod your teammates to pick up these items when they happen to be reserved for them. You can keep the armor pieces through multiple mission attempts, and apparently all you need are four pieces, not all four separate parts, so eventually you should be able to pull this one off, even if you have to grab all the pieces yourself across multiple missions. It’s not that difficult to do in a single try, though, if you have a decent team.
Fort Ranik

You can use the trebuchets in this area to blast the entire Charr army to pieces.
Fort Ranik is another fairly straightforward mission, where your goal is to push your way through many, many Charr until you reach the armies that have broken through the Northern Wall and into Ascalon, then push them back across the wall or just destroy them outright. Most of this level is hack-and-slash, but when you reach the plain at the end of the mission, you’ll have to reassemble one of the broken trebuchets with parts found from nearby wrecked catapults and use that to destroy the mass of enemies waiting for you. There’s another trebuchet closer to the wall; if you have a hearty Monk or Warrior that doesn’t mind dying for the cause, they can run up to the ramp leading up the wall, grab aggro on all the enemies, then lure them back to the fire near the bottom of the ramp. While the Charr are wailing on your sacrificial lamb, fling the trebuchet at the fire and you should take out the entire group. Since you’re near the end of the mission anyway, you can just res your dead ally (they’ll get killed by the explosion if they’re anywhere near it), run up the ramp, kill any remaining enemies, then end the mission.
Bonus: We recall this as being fairly simple. There’s an NPC trapped in a cage by two Charr Overseers; he’s up a switchback ramp near the canyon that leads to the trebuchet field. You should spot him on your map while you’re running around, so head up the ramp and free him for your bonus experience.
Ruins of Surmia
(Note that Fort Ranik doesn’t take you to the Ruins of Surmia. In order to reach it, you need to leave from the Frontier Gate, walk north across the Wall, then wrap around to the west until you find the mission zone. There is a quest called, oddly enough, Ruins of Surmia which will take you from the first zone to the Ruins. It’s a fairly short walk.)
This is where the missions start becoming fairly lengthy. Most of this mission is fairly straightforward, as Prince Rurik will be around to shephard you towards the many corrals in which the Ascalon soldiers have been penned up. In one of them, you’ll find Erol, who’ll run you up to the ruins of a destroyed castle. While Rurik and Erol wait for your party, you’ll need to run down to the water below and follow the path around to the far side of the moat and kill the enemies there before dropping the drawbridge with the lever by the door. (Feel free to kill the enemies in the area before dropping the bridge, if you want experience and loot.) At that point, the dynamic duo will cross the bridge and hatch a plan to escape from the castle, by freeing more captive mages and using them to open a teleport to the Nolani Academy.
Bonus: The bonus here is given you to by a soldier standing watch over the road near the watery moat, after you guide Runik to the raised bridge; you’ll probably be able to spot him on your map as you’re running around. She’ll ask you to track down some Flame Keepers and kill them. As you get this quest, you’ll notice some Charr walking down behind you. These Ember Bearers may appear to be ripe for the picking, but if you want to successfully complete the mission, you’ll have to just follow them from a distance and wait for them to open a wooden gate across the water. When the gate’s open, charge through, slaughter the Ember Bearers, then track down the Flame Keepers near the temple and slay them for your bonus experience.
Nolani Academy

Rurik can heal himself, so let him do the heavy lifting in most of these fights.
Your initial goal here is to defend the Academy from the siege that it’s under by the Charr. There are two ways to go about doing this. The first is to take the northeastern passage out of the Academy, wrap around to the east, head south, then eventually flank and ambush the Charr outside the gates. This can take a while; if you just want to get on with the mission, you can also choose to just open the gates and let the Charr come in. The mages standing around will deal some damage to them, while Rurik himself is an able distraction. The Charr will come in in waves, so it’s not all that difficult to defeat them if you have good healing.
After the Academy is safe, guide Rurik to the south to the ruins of Rin. He’ll blow a big ol’ horn, which has the Incredible Magical Effect of…making it rain. Yay? Anyway, with the flames of the Charr smited, you’ll be able to sweep into the city relatively unmolested. After you meet up with the King, you’ll end the mission and be on your way to Yak’s Bend, the next major part of the game.
Bonus: The bonus here is acquired by following the northeastern path out of the Academy. There’s a man in a valley to the east of the main road who bears a book; when you talk to him, he’ll give one of your party members the book to carry, and ask you to bring it to the graveyard elsewhere in the level, to the southeast of the Academy, if we recall correctly. You’ll know you’re near it when you spot the Spirit of the Fallen enemies. These lvl 10 ghosts are devastating in large numbers, so try to split them up into more manageable groups. We hear that Holy damage lays the hurt out on them, so you may want to get your Monks to bring along one of their offensive spells if they can fit it in their task bar.
When you cut through the ghosts, you’ll have to find a graveyard monument in a small crevasse with steps leading down to it. If the book-carrier clicks on the monument, you’ll get your bonus experience.

Items
One of the unique (and sometimes frustrating) aspects of Guild Wars is that, for a good bulk of your character’s early life, you’re going to be finding virtually nothing of worth on the enemies that you kill. If you’re used to upgrading your items from enemy drops in games like World of Warcraft or Diablo II, then this system can be frustrating, as you’re going to have to wait a while and invest a goodly number of hours in the game before you can start to really get the good loot that’s often the point of these games. Enemies don’t start to drop rare items until you’re into the teen levels, and early magical items (which are represented by blue names when they drop) are often only marginally better than their vendor trash counterparts.
Collectors
Early-game items are going to be best obtained through running quests, and by hitting collectors. In pre-Searing Ascalon, the only way to obtain armor will be to run and find the various collectors that dwell outside the towns. These collectors will ask for a certain number of a certain item, and let you know what they’ll give you in return when you first approach them. For instance, Brownlow, who’s just outside the walls of Ascalon, will request that you bring him five Skale Fins, which drop off of the River Skales and River Skale Tads in the river south of his location. When you return, he’ll offer you a Belt Pouch, which will give you five extra inventory slots.

By the time you actually find some of the crafters, you’ll already have better equipment than what they offer.
There are many collectors scattered throughout the lands, sometimes in difficult-to-reach places (although most of them are pretty easy to reach before the Searing). The key thing to remember here is that collectors are initially the only way to upgrade your armor, so if you’re intent on getting away from the initial armor sets, you might want to try tracking down some of the collectors and upgrading your look. If you don’t want to worry about upgrading your armor before the Searing, then don’t; it’s relatively easy to make the initial armor upgrades in Ascalon City post-Searing, which are going to be better than the stuff the collectors offer you for a good long while. Unfortunately, in post-Searing Ascalon, the collectors will generally give you fairly underwhelming stuff, but you may still want to check their offerings and see what they have available for you. Also note that the offerings of collectors will change based on your primary profession in most situations.
(One notable collector in post-Searing Ascalon is Innis the White in Old Ascalon, near Ambassador Zain. If you bring him four Singed Gargoyle Skulls (found on the many Gargoyles in the area), he’ll offer up a War Hammer that does 11-17 damage, with a massive +25 damage bonus to Charr enemies. Most Warriors will want to pick one of these up for the many missions that will pit you against Charr forces.)
Crafting
In addition to collectors, you can also try your hand at crafting new items when you get past the searing and wind up in the ruined portion of Ascalon City. Crafting before you encounter the Searing is a bit of a pain, and isn’t very rewarding, but immediately after the Searing you should be able to effect some pretty big defensive improvements by hitting up the armorers in Ascalon City and using them to make some new armor.
In order to craft armor, you’re going to need to have a goodly amount of gold (150 per piece is the going rate, it seems), but you’ll also need to have crafting materials, such as Wood Planks, Bolts of Cloth, and so on. (If an item can be used in crafting, it’ll say so in it’s mouse-over description.) Some of these will drop naturally off of enemies, but for the most part, you’re going to have to make your own crafting items by using a Salvage kit on other items that drop. For instance, as you run around killing things, you’ll be picking up plenty of crappy hammers, swords, and pieces of unusable armor off of your enemies. When you buy a Salvage Kit and use it on these pieces of vendor trash, it’ll be converted into some kind of crafting item. (Usually, anyway; some items can’t be salvaged and can only be sold.)
When you have a bunch of crafting items stored away, hit the armorers and see what you need for a certain piece of armor. Most classes will need something corresponding to the type of armor that they wear, so Warriors will need Iron Ingots and the like to construct their chainmail, while less-armorific classes will have to make do with Leather Squares or Bolts of Cloth. Anyway, when you have the required number of crafting items to make an item, you can drag them to the armorer and pay him to put the thing together for you, and voila, a new piece of armor.
Rare Crafting Items
Things get a little more complicated when we start thinking about rare crafting items and item transmutations. In order to make some of the better craftable equipment, you’ll need to have rare crafting items, but these can be difficult to find (as is probably obvious, considering that they’re rare). In order to obtain rare items, you’ll need to either head to a Materialist, or find them yourself with the Expert Salvage Kit.
Materialists are special vendors that can convert Common Crafting Items into Rare Crafting Items, for a price. With your crafting materials in your inventory, you can walk up to a Materialist, hand over your items and some cash and get your sweet, sweet rare crafting materials. The Materialists that we know of dwell just outside the exit from Fort Ranik and the Sanitarium (where the Abbey was pre-Searing), and there’s also an advanced one in the Ascalon Foothills, to the southeast of Yak’s Bend.

When you reach Yak’s Bend, you can find Artisan Rudger in the Ascalon Foothills and have him make some decently rare crafting materials.
This latter vendor is the object of the Missing Artisan quest given to you in Yak’s Bend, and can produce Clay Bricks, Tempered Glass Vials, Leather Square, Vial of Ink, Lump of Charcoal, Spiritwood Plank, Bolt of Linen, and Steel Ingots, all in a one-stop shopping experience. He’s going to be really tough to get to for most players, though, since he’s surrounded by level 10 Hydra. He is, however, relatively close to the entrance from Traveler’s Vale to the Foothills, so if you load up a team full of henchmen, clear your way to the entrance, then just make a break for the Materialist, your henchmen should be able to distract the Hydra long enough for you to get to the Materialist and make your transaction. It obviously helps to have some kind of healing here, as you may get killed shortly after you reach him. If you manage to open up his trade window before you die, though, it should be open and ready to go after you resurrect back at the shrine, allowing you to cheat death yet again.
So the basic recipe for crafting items that need rare ingredients is to find out what you need, obtain the common crafting items by converting vendor trash with a Salvage Kit, then hitting up a Materialist to get the rare items that you need. (If you’re having trouble finding the common crafting items, then you can return to Ascalon City and talk to the Materials Trader there, who’ll usually have a bunch of common items up for sale.)
Expert Salvage Kits will also allow you to nab rare crafting materials. When you obtain Expert Salvage Kits (which you can buy off the merchant in Yak’s Bend when you reach that town, or have guildmates buy for you if you’re not that far), you can use them just like a normal salvage kit, but Expert kits will give you a small chance to retrieve rare parts from the crap you salvage. Not everything can yield rare crafting items, though; indeed, most of the vendor trash and salvage items that drop in the areas around Ascalon will never yield rare items, no matter how often you break them down. It’s best to reserve your Expert kits for items that you find around Yak’s Bend and beyond if you don’t want to waste their significant cost (400 gold a pop).
Upgrading
Another type of vendor that you’ll find in the cities of Tyria are Weapons vendors. These guys offer up numerous substandard weapons for sale, if you’re in the mood to pick up something terrible, but will more importantly give you the chance to customize weapons. Customizing a weapon will prevent anyone but you from using it, and will add 20% to the total damage, for the low low cost of 10 gold.
In addition to straightforward upgrading, you can also happen to find runes and upgrade parts when you use your Expert Salvage Kit on certain salvage items and weapons. These runes and upgrades will list their effects on their tooltip when you mouse over them; if you think you can make immediate use of these items, doubleclick on them to apply them to a piece of armor or another item. Since you replace your armor only very rarely, it’s best to throw runes onto armor; weapon upgrades obviously have to have to be used on weapons themselves, so be sure you have something useful in hand before using one, as using an upgrade permanently removes it from your inventory.
Note that many of these upgrades will list themselves as being “unlocked” when you first find them; this means that, should you decide to create a PVP-exclusive character at the character creation screen, you’ll be able to apply these runes and upgrades to your equipment free of charge.
PVP Tips
One of the main draws of Guild Wars is its strong PVP component, in which you can jump right into a fight with a minimal wait, fight for a few minutes, then keep going or go back to the PVE content if you wish. PVP in Guild Wars is a fun, fast-paced experience, but one that’s quite a bit different than PVE and will require a bit of customization on your part if you want to get the most out of the experience. This section of the guide isn’t intended to be the be-all-and-end-all of PVP tippery (tippage? Tipology?) but hopefully we can provide a few pointers to get you on your way towards battlefield dominance.
There are a few PVP battlegrounds in Guild Wars, including those in Ascalon City, Yak’s Bend, and one at Fort Koga at game’s end. If you enter one of these zones, you’ll be able to choose Start Mission to warp yourself into a PVP game with three random other players. After that, you’ll have 25 seconds to get steeled up for the fight, at which points the gates open and it’s kill-or-be-killed action. You do get experience for winning in PVP, even though you don’t get gold or items, so it can be a way to improve your character while having fun at the same time.
Use Resurrection Signets
Resurrection Signets are non-optional in PVP combat. Sorry, but they’re not; all of your party members should have them on their skill bar when they enter a game. You obviously can’t control your human teammates’ skill choices, but at the very least be sure to have Resurrection Signet good to go when you enter a PVP round. It only takes three seconds to cast, and will restore your target to full life when used. Of course, you can only use it once, but it’s one of the only ways for non-Monks to resurrect a teammate.
Monks do have the option of using Resurrect or Restore Life multiple times in a PVP battle, but you probably shouldn’t do so. Each of these requires eight full seconds to cast, making it quite likely that you’ll be interrupted or knocked down by an enemy while casting them. Although they do have the lure of being theoretically usable as often as you like, in practice you’re unlikely to be able to get even one off. Resurrection Signet also has the bonus of being free to cast, making it easily usable even when you’re running low on energy.
Signet of Capture
One of the reasons that players who go through the PVE content before jumping into the end-game PVP will be so powerful is because of the Signet of Capture, which lets you obtain Elite skills from boss monsters scattered around the game world. To obtain a Signet of Capture, make your way to Quarrel Falls and buy one from the skills vendor there. Each Signet of Capture will cost you one skill point, but the gold required to buy it will be calculated separately from your normal skills, meaning that it should be much cheaper to obtain.
With a Signet of Capture in your inventory, you can equip it to your skill bar before heading out into the wilderness. When you fight boss enemies (the ones that are outlined in color), check what they’re casting by watching their status bar, and capture one of their skills by using the Signet immediately after they cast something you want. You’ll lose your Signet of Capture when you capture a skill, but you can buy as many of them as you want and carry them around like inventory items (although you’ll still only be able to equip them in town, like normal skills).
The important thing about Signet of Capture is that it’s the only way to net Elite skills, which will have a direct impact on your efficiency in PVP. Elite skills aren’t necessarily overpowering, but in many cases they are going to be strictly better than normal skills, or have powerful effects that you won’t find on skills you can buy from a skills vendor. If you want to be great in PVP, then you’ll probably want to continue to search out boss enemies and steal their skills with Signet of Capture in PVE, even after you hit level 20 and have “beaten” the game.
Avoid Pre-Made Characters

Always take a few seconds to Tab through your enemies before engaging them in combat. Knowing what you’re up against will let you target the weak link and take it out.
If you’re serious about playing PVP, then you may be tempted to use the PVP-Only Character option at the character creation screen. PVP-Only characters come pre-loaded to level 20 with some decent equipment, but they’re weak in a lot of respects. For one thing, most of the skills in the game will be locked off to your PVP characters until you find them with a Roleplaying Character, meaning that you’ll only have a dozen or so skills to your name if you make a PVP character as soon as you install the game. You also won’t have the benefit of runes or weapon upgrades.
If you really want a prime PVP experience, then, be sure not to create a PVP character right off the bat; instead, you’ll probably want to play through the roleplaying game and find as much Phat Lewt as possible, and unlock as many skills as possible, before ascending to the Hall of the Gods and going crazy in PVP combat there. You can probably contribute with a pre-made PVP character, but you’re going to be at a severe disadvantage compared to the grognards who’ve pumped their characters up with runes and have found dozens of elite skills.
Customize Your Skills
The neat thing about PVP play is that the skillset you choose for PVE isn’t going to be quite as effective as you might think. Warriors and the like will often spec for pure damage in PVE play, but in PVP things like interrupting and hexing your opponents becomes awfully important as well.
Finding the perfect balance of skills is going to take a little trial-and-error; you just have to learn to be flexible and sometimes dump that totally killtacular skill in favor of one with a more subtle, but more useful effect. If you’re planning on playing PVP for a while, then you might even want to consider refocusing your attributes or equipment to allow for more effective play. For example, Blood Magic is probably a bit more useful in PVP than is Death Magic for Necros (no offense, Death Necros), thanks to its ability to cause massive health loss over time for your opponents, so you might want to just take away some of your Death Magic points and pump them into Blood Magic before a furious bout of PVP action gets going. You’ll use up one Attribute Refund point for each point you take off, but you gain another one back for each 250 experience you earn in PVE combat, so you’ll normally be running around with the maximum amount of points here anyway. Mesmers are going to need to be especially careful in switching their spells around, as they have plenty of spells that are too narrow to be of much use in PVE, but which are powerhouses in PVP, when you’re assured of going up against casters.
Equipment changes aren’t usually so drastic, but Warriors may find that they like to use one type of weapon in PVP and another type in PVE, perhaps due to the fact that they have a larger number of skills for Swords than for Hammers, but have a big Hammer that’s useful in PVE beatdowns. (Although, while we’re on the topic, the Warrior’s Hammer Bash skill is one of the best ways to prevent casters from casting spells in PVP.) Casters may also want to change their wands and off-hand items as the situation dictates, since many of them have bonuses that are tied to their attribute points.
Customize Your Interface
Another aspect of the PVP game that you may want to modify to suit your style is the interface. There are a few features in the interface that you don’t necessarily need to have on your screen in PVP battle, such as your experience bar, the trade button, and, if you only use one type of weapon, the weapons bar. If you want to reduce screen clutter, feel free to eliminate anything you don’t find yourself using in PVP battles; you can always restore them later if you feel like it.
By clicking on the “Edit Interface” button in the Customize tab in the Menu, you’ll also be able to move screen elements around. We found it helpful to move the Effects Monitor closer to the center of the screen from its starting position, to help us monitor harmful Hexes that were being placed on us, but again, feel free to mix and match as you like.
Go For The Healers
Speaking as people who play primarily as a healing Monk, there’s nothing we like more than when a group of enemies ignores us and lets us do our healing from behind the front lines. When we don’t have to worry about our own health, we can safely sit back, cast Healing Breeze over and over again, and when things go rough, we have a large reservoir of health to convert into healing with Infuse Health. Infuse Health is a skill that takes half of the Monk’s current health and transfers it to the target ally, with a percentage boost tacked on top of it. Any decent Monk that’s gone through a significant amount of the game’s PVE content will have unlocked this skill, so you can bet that it’ll pop up during PVP play as well. When a Monk is left alone, it essentially lets him or her instantly heal a single ally to full health, when they’ve boosted their Healing attribute a good way up, and that’s pretty damn powerful for something that only costs 10 Energy. If you consistently harry and harrass Monks, though, the effectiveness of Infuse Health is reduced, since it works off of their current health total. Drop their health, and Infuse Health becomes a non-factor in a fight.

RUN AWAAAAAAY! A single powerful warrior can harry a Monk quite effectively.
What’s more, it’s just plain annoying to get beat on when you’re a Monk. As long as we have energy, we’ll usually be able to survive for a good long while, but we’ll have to focus a large amount of our energy towards healing ourselves rather than our teammates. When you beat on a Monk, you can expect them to use Healing Breeze fairly often, and when you get towards the end of the game, you can expect this to give them six-eight ticks of health regeneration, which is going to be enough to counteract a single warrior’s damage in most cases. If you have any methods of eliminating enchantments, then, it’d be wise to concentrate fire on the Monk and blast away their Healing Breeze before it works too well. Mesmer skills are especially annoying to Monks, with things like Backfire being tremendously effective in shutting them down.
Anyway, if you get rid of a Monk, then you’ll definitely have an easier time beating the rest of a PVP team. You’ll have to kill the Monk twice, or perhaps three times in some fights, due to Resurrection Signets, but after they come back to life they’ll won’t have much energy in the tank, so hit them again before they can build it back up and get back into the fight. You shouldn’t exclusively focus on a Monk, but you’ll probably want to dedicate at least two of your players to killing them.
This is all contingent on there actually being a healing Monk on the other team, of course; many times there won’t be. In that case you can aim for whomever you like. We find Necromancers and Rangers to be ideal primary targets in these cases, due to their ability to cast area heals for their party members like Well of Blood.
You know what? Again, speaking as people who primarily play as Healing Monks, forget all that. We were just kidding. Leave us alone and let us heal.
Mesmerism FTW
Although Mesmers aren’t necessarily a powerhouse class in PVE, they can be justly feared in PVP combat by casters and warriors alike. Since you stand a good chance of facing off against casters in any given PVP battle, though, you’re going to want to ensure that you have plenty of skills on your taskbar as a Mesmer to deal with them.
Most casters will naturally be using their wands to fill up the deadspace between spellcasting, so Spirit Shackle can be valuable in penalizing them for not paying attention to their buff bar, since it’ll drain them of five energy each time they attack. (This is of course also quite valuable when used on Warriors, since it’ll likely drain their energy completely if it has a boosted duration.) If you’re interested in stealing energy from an enemy, then Energy Tap and Energy Drain are both good for ripping your enemy’s resources away from them. They do virtually the same thing, save that Energy Drain has a slightly shorter casting time and is Elite. The virtue in using both of them, though, is that they both have a 20 second cooldown time, meaning that you won’t be able to use Energy Tap more than three times a minute. Adding Energy Drain will allow you to steal energy twice as often, and since these skills are effectively free (since you steal more than they cost, assuming you don’t get interrupted), you can feel free to cast them on enemy spellcasters as often as you wish.
Other useful spells for PVP are Shatter Enchantment and Drain Enchantment, both of which strip enchantment spells from a target foe, and either damage that foe or restore energy to the Mesmer. If your team prefers to gang up on a single target, then be sure to cast one of these as soon as you spot a Healing Breeze effect pop onto the enemy, as this is the spell that many Monks will be relying on to deal their damage.
In addition to their anti-energy spells, Mesmers have a lot of ways to deal with physical damage. Soothing Images is a specifically anti-Warrior spell, in that it prevents the target from gaining adrenaline for a goodly length of time, effectively preventing them from using any of their Warrior combat skills for the duration. If one of the members of your team is running away from an attacker (or if you yourself are getting pounded), you can lay down Imagined Burden to cut the attacker’s movement speed in half for a few seconds, long enough to let them effect their getaway.
This is just a basic toot-of-the-horn for Mesmers. It’s a difficult profession to be good at, and many of their skills are less than overwhelming in PVE combat, but a well-played Mesmer in PVP is a valuable addition to any team.
Charrrrge!
In most PVP matches, there’s going to be a period of waiting at the outset. After the gates open, most teams will pause for a second, tab through the enemy ranks, and pick their targets. If your team has won a few rounds together, then you may be able to increase your chances of winning by just running towards your enemies pell-mell and smashing into them before they have time to pick their targets. This works best when you have a single able player that’s good at locking on to the weakest member of an enemy team and whom can lead a team with targetting, preferably a warrior. If you work together as a team, you can just switch on autorun, follow your leader into the enemy group, and start chopping before they get situated. This is especially helpful when taking on enemy groups that are in their first game and haven’t had time to mesh.
You Win Some, You Lose Some

A good group is a wonderful thing, if only because they’re few and far between.
The thing to remember about PVP in Guild Wars is that, due to the fact that your groups are randomized in most of the arenas, you stand an even chance of being put into a pretty poorly composed group. You know the ones: all Mesmers, all Elementalists and Necromancers, or so on. You really do need variety in a group to succeed, so when you come up into a poorly-composed group, you should play to win, but a lot of the times you’re kind of doomed from the start, with player ability being an X factor.
On the flip side, no matter how good your group is, there’s always going to be another group out there that’s a little better, whether in terms of group dynamics or composition. There are enough Warrior/Monks out there in the game world to make it an even bet that you’ll eventually come across a group with three of them and another character. We faced off against a group once that was three Warrior/Monks and a Monk/Warrior, and we’re pretty sure that that kind of group can keep going until one of the members has to quit.
So, in short, don’t get frustrated if you lose a few times in a row; it happens to everyone. Eventually you’ll find a group that meshes, and you’ll be off on a 15-0 tear. And when that happens, it makes for some pretty memorable gameplay!
Acknowledgements
Thanks to GameSpot forum users Cold-Fusion, twisted_by_dezign, Pug_of_Crydee, and especially F1_2004 for their contributions to the PVP section of this guide.

THE AZTEC ACCOUNT OF THE SPANISH CONQUEST OF MEXICO

THE AZTEC ACCOUNT OF THE SPANISH CONQUEST OF MEXICO
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The Aztec Account of the
Spanish Conquest of Mexico
By Bernal Diaz del Castillo (1492-1584)
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The Aztec Account of the Spanish Conquest of Mexico
Introduction
On November 8, 1519, the Spanish
conquistadors first entered the great city
of Mexico, the metropolis the Aztecs had
built on a lake island. Don Hernando
Cortes, who was accompanied by six
hundred Spaniards and a great many
native allies, at last could see for himself
the temples and palaces about which he
had heard so many marvels. The
Spaniards arrived from the direction of
Tlalpan, to the south of the city, passing
across one of the wide causeways that
connected the island with the mainland.
When they reached a locality known as
Xoloco, they were welcomed by the last
of the Motecuhzomas, who had come out to meet them in the belief that the white men must be
Quetzalcoatll and other gods, returning at last from across the waters now known as the Gulf of
Mexico. Thus Cortes and his men entered the city, not only as guests, but also as gods coming
home. It was the first direct encounter between one of the most extraordinary pre-Columbian
cultures and the strangers who would eventually destroy it.
Cortes landed on the coast at Veracruz on Good Friday, April 22, 1519; the Aztec capital
surrendered to him on August 13, 1521. The events that took place between these two dates have
been recounted in a number of chronicles and other writings, of which the best known are the
letters Cortes wrote to King Charles V and the True History of the Conquest of Mexico by Bernal
Diaz del Castillo. These two works, along with a few others also written by Spaniards, until now
have been almost the only basis on which historians have judged the conquest of one of the
greatest civilizations in pre-Columbian America.
But these chronicles present only one side of the story, that of the conquerors. For some reasonscorn,
perhaps-historians have failed to consider that the conquered might have set down their
own version in their own language. This book is the first to offer a selection from those
indigenous accounts, some of them written as early as 1528, only seven years after the fall of the
city. These writings make up a brief history of the Conquest as told by the victims, and include
passages written by native priests and wise men who managed to survive the persecution and
death that attended the final struggle. The manuscripts from which we have drawn are now
preserved in a number of different libraries, of which the most important are the National Library
in Paris, the Laurenziana Library in Florence and the library of the National Museum of
Anthropology in Mexico City.
Path of the Conquest
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The Indian accounts of the Conquest contain many passages whose dramatic interest is equal to
that of the great classical epics. As Homer, singing in the Iliad of the fall of Troy, depicted
scenes of the most vivid tragic realism, so the native writers, masters of the black and red ink
evoked the most dramatic moments of the Conquest. A few paragraphs from the documents
presented in this book will make this clear.
The Indian chroniclers describe the beginning of the terrible slaughter perpetrated by Pedro de
Alvarado in the patio of the main temple in Tenochtitlan. After mentioning the first rituals of the
fiesta that was being celebrated-a fiesta in which “song was linked to song”- they tell how the
Spaniards entered the sacred patio:
They ran in among the dancers, forcing their way to the place where the
drums were played. They attacked the man who was drumming and cut off
his arms. Then they cut off his head, and it rolled across the floor.
They attacked all the celebrants, stabbing them, spearing them, striking
them with their swords. They attacked some of them from behind, and these
fell instantly to the ground with their entrails hanging out. Others they
beheaded: they cut off their heads, or split their heads to pieces.
They struck others in the shoulders, and their arms were torn from their
bodies. They wounded some in the thigh and some in the calf. They slashed
others in the abdomen, and their entrails all spilled to the ground. Some
attempted to run away, but their intestines dragged as they ran; they seemed
to tangle their feet in their own entrails. No matter how they tried to save
themselves, they could find no escape.
Another passage, a masterpiece of the descriptive art of the Aztecs, shows how the Indians
pictured the “stags or deer” on which the Spaniards rode. Motolinia, one of the early
missionaries, wrote that the Indians “were filled with wonder to behold their horses, and the
Spaniards riding on their backs.” Now they present their own description, so vivid that it recalls
another extraordinary picture of the horse, written in Hebrew by the author of the Book of Job.
They report:
The “stags” came forward, carrying the soldiers on their backs. The soldiers
were wearing cotton armor. They bore their leather shields and their iron
spears in their hands, but their swords hung down from the necks of the
“stags.”
These animals wear little bells, they are adorned with many little bells. When
the “stags” gallop, the bells make a loud clamor, ringing and reverberating.
These ” stags, ” these “horses,” snort and bellow. They sweat a very great
deal, the sweat pours from their bodies in streams. The foam from their
muzzles drips onto the ground. It spins out in fat drops, like a lather of
amole.
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They make a loud noise when they run; they make a great din, as if stones
were raining on the earth. Then the ground is pitted and scarred where they
set down their hooves. It opens wherever their
hooves touch it.
The indigenous documents contain a number of scenes
like these, so vivid that they seem to invite the artist to
interpret them with his pen or brush. But to understand
this epic narrative of the Conquest, it is important to
know something of Aztec history, geography and culture.
The following sketch is necessarily limited to the broad
outlines, but at least it will provide a context in which the
indigenous narratives can be seen more clearly.
Cultural Stages of Ancient Mexico
The grandeur that the conquistadors beheld in the Aztec
capital was obviously not the result of spontaneous
generation. It was the last phase of a long cultural
sequence beginning well before the Christian era. In this
brief review of the evolution of culture in ancient
Mexico, we will attempt to correlate the various stages
with well-known events in the history of the Old World.
Although man has existed on earth for at least half a million years, the first human beings to
reach the American continent appear to have arrived only about twenty thousand years ago. Man
is an even more recent phenomenon in the Valley of Mexico, since the most ancient human
fossil-discovered in Tepexpan, near the famous pyramids of Teotihuacan-is probably no more
than ten thousand years old.
The development of superior cultural forms also came much later in America than in the Old
World. Egypt and Mesopotamia had contrived modes of writing as far back as the fourth
millennium before Christ, but in America-specifically in Mexico-we must wait until the middle
of the second millennium B.c. before we can discover the earliest vestiges of systematic
agriculture and the making of pottery.
The most ancient architectural remains in Mexico, indicating the presence of ceremonial centers,
date from about five hundred years before Christ, a time when the Old World had already heard
the words of the Biblical prophets, and when the first pre-socratic philosophers had already
spoken in Greece. Perhaps the earliest cultural ferment of any importance in pre-Columbian
Mexico took place on the coast of the Gulf of Mexico. A number of extraordinary artifacts have
been found there, along with the oldest calendar inscription yet discovered. For lack of a better
name, these mysterious artificers have been called the Olmecs, an Aztec word meaning “people
of the region of rubber.” At a later period their art, techniques and religious ideas influenced a
The Valley of Mexico
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number groups which had migrated from the distant northern shores of the Pacific Ocean. This
cultural influence was to have significant and widespread consequences.
At the beginning of the Christian era, while Rome was consolidating her empire and Christianity
had begun to spread through the Mediterranean world, Mexico witnessed the emergence of what
can also be called true empires. The foundations of the earliest sacred cities of the Mayas-Tikal,
Uaxactun, Copan and Palenque -were constructed in the jungles of Central America. And in the
central region of Mexico, about thirty-five miles north of the modern capital, the great “city of
the gods”-Teotihuacan-began to rise. Its pyramids, palaces, sculptures, frescoes and inscriptions
would become a paradigm and inspiration for the artists and artisans of later peoples. Many of its
inscriptions and representations of the gods were reproduced in the Aztec art and codices of the
Conquest period. The apogee of Mayan and Teotihuacan culture coincides in time with the fall of
the Roman Empire.
During the fourth and fifth centuries A.D. inscriptions based on a partly ideographic, partly
phonetic mode of writing became extremely abundant, especially among the Mayas. They testify
to the fact that these cultures possessed a profound sense of time and history. The Mayan
calendar is further proof, for it was slightly closer to the astronomical year than our own presentday
calendar, and much closer than that being used in Europe at the same period.
The great ritual centers at Teotihuacan and in the Mayan area began to decline in the eighth and
ninth centuries and were eventually abandoned. The causes are for the most part unknown. Some
authors have attributed their downfall to the arrival of new tribes from the north; at least it is
certain that the northern barbarians like the Germanic tribes in the Roman world-were a constant
threat to established cultures. In Europe the ninth century saw the consolidation of feudalism; a
little later new kingdoms were founded within a cultural milieu composed of Greco-Roman and
barbarian elements. A new state also arose in central Mexico and culturally it was also a
composite, having been greatly influenced by the Teotihuacan civilization. This was the socalled
“Toltec Empire,” composed of people from the north who spoke the same Nahuatl tongue
which a few centuries later became the language of the Aztecs.
The Toltecs settled in Tula, about fifty-five miles northeast of the City of Mexico, and under the
aegis of their great culture-hero, Quetzalcoatl, they gradually extended the civilization created at
Teotihuacan. A number of indigenous texts describe the Toltecs in detail: they were superb
artisans, devout worshipers, skillful tradesmen- extraordinary persons in every way. Their
prestige became so great that for the Aztecs the word “Toltec” was a synonym for “artist.” The
cultural achievements of the Toltecs spread far beyond their city at Tula; in fact their influence
even reached down into Yucatan and Central America, where it can be clearly discerned in the
Mayan religious center at Chichen-Itza. As a result of these Toltec influences, the Mayas
experienced a major cultural renascence.
But Tula, like other cities before it, was finally abandoned, perhaps because of fresh invasions
from the north. Quetzalcoatl departed eastward, promising that some day he would return from
across the sea. The new arrivals adopted the cultures of Teotihuacan and the Toltecs, and a
number of city-states began, to form along the shores of the great lake in the Valley of Mexico.
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This was the beginning of another cultural renascence, almost exactly contemporaneous with the
early Renaissance in Italy.
In the thirteenth century two of the city-states achieved
considerable splendor. One of them, the famous
Culhuacan, was located on the southern shore of the lake,
near what is now the University of Mexico. Much of its
greatness resulted from the fact that many of its
inhabitants were of Toltec origin. The other state,
Azcapotzalco, which now forms part of the northeastern
sector of the capital, was a mixture of a great many
ethnic groups. Its people were especially gifted as
warriors and administrators, and Azcapotzalco therefore
became a good deal more powerful than its neighbor to
the south.
The Aztecs or Mexicas were the last of the many
nomadic tribes to enter the Valley of Mexico from the
north. They arrived during the middle of the thirteenth
century, and attempted to settle in one or another of the
flourishing city-states, but wherever they appeared, they
were violently driven away as undesirable foreigners. It
is true that they spoke the same language as the old
Toltecs, but otherwise they were almost totally
uncultured. The only heritage they brought with them, besides the Nahuatl tongue, was an
indomitable will.
After a whole series of defeats and humiliations, the Aztecs succeeded in establishing themselves
on an island in the lake; the ancient codices state that their city was founded in the year 1325. A
little more than a century later, incredible as it may seem, this destitute tribe had been able to
assimilate the old cultural traditions and, at the same time, to achieve complete independence.
Then they began their career as conquerors, extending their rule from the Gulf coast to the
Pacific and as far south as Guatemala-and again they accomplished all this in only one century.
Their capital grew rich and powerful, much more powerful than Teotihuacan or Tula had ever
been. Its temples, palaces and gardens were so magnificent that the Spanish conquistadors gaped
in astonishment.
During this same period, however, the Old World had begun to discover new regions. Portuguese
navigators reached Madeira and the Azores between 1416 and 1432- the first step toward the
discovery of the New World. Other explorers crossed the Equator off the coast of Africa in about
1470, and in 1487 Bartolomew Diaz sailed as far as the Cape of Good Hope. Less than a decade
later Christopher Columbus landed on the shores of America. Hence, the “explosion” which
spread Aztec rule and planted Aztec culture over vast regions was contemporaneous with another
expansionist movement, and the latter, with superior weapons, techniques and tactics, proved
much the more powerful. When the Old World and the Aztecs in the New World met face to face
Tenochtitlan
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on that November day in 1519, their attitudes toward each other very different. The Aztecs, as
we have said, thought the strangers were Quetzalcoatl and other gods returning from over the
sea, while the Spaniards-despite their amazement at the splendors of Tenochtitlan- considered
the Aztecs barbarians and thought only of seizing their riches and of forcing them to become
Christians and Spanish subjects.
This confrontation, vividly described both by the conquistadors and the natives, was something
more than a meeting between two expanding nations; it was the meeting of two radically
dissimilar cultures, two radically different modes of interpreting existence. Spain had recently
brought the long wars of reconquest against the Moors to a triumphant conclusion and was now
the greatest power in Europe. The Aztec state had also reached a climax, and its magnificence
was evident in its capital city and its vigorous religious, social, economic and political structure.
To understand more clearly the tragic loss that resulted from the destruction of indigenous
culture, it will be useful to view the great city as the “gods” viewed it before they leveled it to the
ground.
Tenochtitlan, the Aztec Metropolis
The beginnings of the Aztec capital were very humble. It was founded on a low-lying island so
undesirable that other tribes had not bothered to occupy it. The indigenous chronicles describe
the difficulties with which the Aztecs managed to build a few miserable huts and a small altar to
their supreme deity, the war-god Huitzilopochth. But their fierce will overcame every obstacle.
Less than two centuries later, the Spanish conquistador Bernal Diaz del Castillo thought that the
wonders he beheld must be a dream. The Spaniards had been welcomed into the city as guests of
Motecuhzoma, and a party of them-led by Cortes-climbed up to the flat top of the pyramid on
which the main temple was built. They were met by the Aztec king himself, who pointed out the
various sights.
So we stood looking about us, or that huge and cursed temple stood so high
that from it one could see over everything very well, and we saw the three
causeways which led into Mexico, that is the causeway of Iztapalapa by
which we had entered four days before, and that of Tacuba, and that of
Tepeaquilla, and we saw the fresh water that comes from Chapultepec which
supplies the city, and we saw the bridges on the three causeways which were
built at certain distances apart through which the water of the lake flowed in
and out from one side to the other, and we beheld on that great lake a great
multitude of canoes, some coming with supplies of food and others returning
loaded with cargoes or merchandise; and we saw that from every house of
that great city and of all the other cities that were built in the water it was
impossible to pass from house to house, except by drawbridges which were
made of wood or in canoes; and we saw in those cities Cues [temples] and
oratories like towers and fortresses and all gleaming white, and it was a
wonderful thing to behold; then the houses with flat roofs, and on the
causeways other small towers and oratories which were like fortresses.
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After having examined and considered all that we had seen we turned to look
at the great market place and the crowds of people that were in it, some
buying and others selling, so that the murmur and hum of their voices and
words that they used could be heard more than a league off. Some of the
soldiers among us who had been in many parts of the world, in
Constantinople, and all over Italy, and in Rome, said that so large a market
place and so full of people, and so well regulated and arranged, they had
never beheld before.
The Spanish soldier had good reasons for describing the city in such enthusiastic terms. Almost
nothing remains today of what he saw, but his account is corroborated by other writings, ancient
maps and archaeological investigations.
At the time of the Conquest, the area of the island on which the city stood had been increased by
means of fills, until it comprised a more or less regular square measuring about two miles on
each side. It was joined on the north to the island of Tlatelolco, originally an independent city,
but annexed by the Aztecs in 147 3. Tlatelolco was connected with the mainland by a causeway
that ran to the sanctuary of the mother-goddess Tonantzin on the northern shore of the lake. At
the present day the site of her temple is occupied by the Basilica of Tepeyac, dedicated to
Mexico’s patron saint, the Virgin of Guadalupe.
To the south of Tenochtitlan, another causeway-the one by which the Spaniards entered-joined
the mainland at Iztapalapa. The eastern edge of the city bordered the wide expanse of the lake,
and only during the clearest weather was it possible to see the city of Tezcoco, home of the
famous poet-king Nezahualcoyotl, on the opposite shore. Finally, on the west, another causeway
joined the city with the allied kingdom of Tlacopan or Tacuba; it was along this causeway that
the Spaniards fled on the disastrous Night of Sorrows.
Tenochtitlan was divided into four great sections. To the northwest stood Cuepopan, “the place
where flowers bloom,” which now forms the barrio or sector known as Santa Maria la Redonda;
to the southwest, Moyotlan, “the place of the gnats,” later dedicated by the Spanish missionaries
to the honor of St. John the Baptist; to the southeast, Teopan, “the place of the gods,” which
included the precinct of the main temple and which was known in colonial times by the name of
San Pablo; and to the northeast, Atzacoalco, “in the house of the herons,” which became the site
where the missionaries built the church of San Sebastian.
The two most important places in the capital were the sacred precinct of the main temple, with its
related temples, schools and other structures (in all, it contained seventy-eight buildings), and the
huge plaza in Tlatelolco that served as the principal market place, offering an astonishing variety
of products from far and near. The walled precinct of the main temple formed a great square
measuring approximately five hundred yards on each side. Today nothing is left of the temple
except a few remains that can be seen near the eastern walls of the Cathedral of Mexico. A
model of the precinct has recently been installed there.
The palace of Axayacatl, who ruled from 1469 to 148 1, stood on the western side of the main
temple, and it was here that the Spaniards were lodged when they arrived in the city as
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Motecuhzoma’s guests. The palace of Motecuhzoma, facing a broad plaza, stood on the site now
occupied by the National Palace of Mexico. And in addition to these and other structures, there
was a large number of lesser temples and stone and mortar buildings reserved as living quarters
for the nobles, merchants, artists and other persons. The streets of Tenochtitlan were
comparatively narrow, many of them with canals through which canoes from the lakeshore could
reach the center of the city. The capital boasted many other attractions, and the Spaniards were
particularly impressed by the botanical and zoological gardens, as nothing of the kind existed at
that time in their native land.
The population of Tenochtitlan at the time of the Conquest has been the subject of considerable
controversy, but beyond question it must have amounted at least to a quarter of a million. The
activities were many and colorful. Fiestas, sacrifices and other rituals were celebrated in honor of
the gods. Teachers and students met in the various calmecac and telpuchealli, the pre-Hispanic
centers of education. The coming and going of merchant canoes and the constant bustle in the
Tlatelolco market impressed the Spaniards so much that they compared the city to an enormous
anthill. The military exercises and the arrival and departure of the warriors were other colorful
spectacles. In brief, the life of Tenochtitlan was that of a true metropolis. The city was visited by
governors and ambassadors from distant regions. Gold, silver, rich feathers, cocoa, bark paper
and other types of tribute, along with slaves and victims for the human sacrifices, streamed in
along the streets and canals. The Spaniards were right: Tenochtitlan was indeed an anthill, in
which each individual worked unceasingly to honor the gods and augment the grandeur of the
city.
The Aztec Empire
The wealth and military power of Tenochtitlan were a result of the conquests accomplished by
Itzcoatl, who ruled between 1428 and 1440. He had joined with Nezahualcoyotl, king of
Tezcoco, to defeat Azcapotzalco and to form the so-called “triple alliance,” made up of
Tenochtitlan, Tezcoco and the relatively insignificant city of Tlacopan (Tacuba).
Another important factor in the growth of Aztec power was the shrewd work of the royal
counselor Tlacaelel, nephew to Itzcoatl who instituted a number of significant reforms in the
tribe’s political, religious, social and economic structure. As a profound student of the cultural
elements inherited from the Toltecs, he made use of everything that served his purpose-but he
also gave everything a special slant, for his purpose was to consolidate the strength and wealth of
the city. One of the indigenous texts in the Codice Matritense describes how Itzcoatl and
Tlacaelel rewarded the principal Aztec chieftains with lands and titles after the victory over
Azcapotzalco, and then says that the king and his adviser decided to give their people a new
version of Aztec history.
The preserved an account of their history,
but later it was burned,
during the reign of Itzcoatl.
The lords of Mexico decreed it,
the lords of Mexico declared:
“It is not fitting that our people
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should know these pictures.
Our people, our subjects, will be lost
and our land destroyed,
for these pictures are full of lies….
In the new version, recorded in a number of extant documents, the Aztecs claim to be descended
from the Toltec nobility, and their gods- Huitzilopochtli in particular-are raised to the same level
as the ancient creative gods Tezcadipoca, and Quetzalcoatl. But most important of all is the
exalted praise given to what can only be called a mystical conception of warfare, dedicating the
Aztec people, the “people of the sun,” to the conquest of all other nations. In part the motive was
simply to extend the rule of Tenochtitlan, but the major purpose was to capture victims for
sacrifice, because the source of all life, the sun, would die unless it were fed with human blood.
As a result, Huitzilopochtli ceased to be the tutelary god of a poor band of outcasts, and his rise
to greatness coincided with that of the Aztecs themselves. The old Toltec prayers, most of them
directed to Quetzalcoatl, were revised in his favor, and his priests composed a number of others.
Since he was identified with the sun, he was called “the Giver of Life” and “the Preserver of
Life.” Tlacaelel did not originate the idea that Huitzilopochtli-the-Sun had to be fed the most
precious food of all-human blood but he was unquestionably responsible for the central
importance that this idea acquired in the Aztec religion.
There is good evidence that human sacrifices were performed in the Valley of Mexico before the
arrival of the Aztecs, but apparently no other tribe ever performed them with such frequency.
The explanation seems to be that Tlacaelel persuaded the Aztec kings (he was counselor to
Motecuhzoma I and his successor Axayacatl after the death of Itzcoatl) that their mission was to
extend the dominions of Huitzilopochtli so that there would be a constant supply of captives to
be sacrificed. Fray Diego de Duran wrote that Itzcoatl “took only those actions which were
counseled by Tlacaelel,” and that he believed it was his mission “to gather together all the
nations” in the service of his god. It was also Tlacaelel who suggested the building of the great
main temple in Tenochtitlan, dedicated to Huitzilopochtli. Before the Spaniards destroyed it, it
was the scene of innumerable sacrifices of captives, first from nearby places and later from such
distant regions as Oaxaca, Chiapas and Guatemala.
The changes brought about by Tlacaelel in Aztec religious thought and ritual were his most
important accomplishments, but he also reformed the judicial system, the army, the protocol of
the royal court and the organization of pochtecas, or traveling merchants, and he even directed
the creation of a large botanical garden in Oaxtepec, on the outskirts of Cuauhtla in the presentday
state of Morelos. Despite his key role in Aztec history, Tlacaelel never consented to become
king, even though the nobles offered him the throne on the death of Itzcoatl in 1440 and again on
the death of Motecuhzoma I in 1469. He preferred to be the “power behind the throne,” using his
influence to realize what he considered to be the grand destiny of his people. He died a little
before 1481, without suspecting, of course, that the magnificence and power for which he was so
largely responsible would be destroyed in less than forty years. Considering the unquestionable
brilliance of this unusual man, who has been seriously neglected by the historians, one is tempted
to ask: What would have happened had the Spaniards arrived during his lifetime? The question is
unanswerable, but at least it is an interesting topic for speculation.
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To return for a moment to the conquests inspired by Tlacaelel’s advice, they began, as we have
seen, with the defeat of Azcapotzalco and the formation of the alliance with Tezcoco and
Tlacopan. Then the Aztecs set out to conquer the other city states around the lake, and one by
one Coyoacan, Cuitlahuac, Xochimilco and Chalco were forced to submit. Other states, alarmed
by the Aztecs’ growing power, elected to sign treaties with Tenochtitlan and to deliver it tribute.
Among these was the city-state of the Tlahuicas, a people with the same language and culture as
the Aztecs, in the southern part of what is now the state of Morelos.
Next the Aztecs marched eastward toward the Gulf coast, where the people of Cempoala also
agreed to pay tribute. It was in Cempoala that the Spaniards later took excellent advantage of the
enmity the Cempoaltecas bore toward their masters.
The succeeding phase of Aztec expansion was toward the south. Sometimes the armies arrived as
conquerors, at other times in search of trade, but their constant aim was to increase the power of
Tenochtitlan. They dominated the present-day states of Oaxaca and Chiapas, penetrated into
Guatemala and even according to some accounts- reached the Isthmus of Panama, sending or
bringing back tribute and trade goods to their capital.
The Aztecs, however, always respected the independence of their neighbors, the Tlaxcaltecas,
whose state was a “confederation of four republics.” There is no doubt that Tenochtitlan could
have overwhelmed Tlaxcala without too much difficulty, and the reason it did not is probably
that it wanted a nearby source of victims for the human sacrifices. Therefore the Aztecs
maintained an almost perpetual state of war with Tlaxcala, but never actually conquered it. Also,
the Aztecs seem to have regarded the frequent battles as a convenient way of testing and training
their younger warriors. This situation was so hateful to the Tlaxcaltecas that when Cortes arrived
they became his most loyal native allies, in the hope that with the aid of the strangers they could
at last defeat their oppressors.
By 1519 the Aztecs ruled over several million human beings, who spoke a variety of languages.
Their empire stretched from the Pacific Ocean to the Gulf coast and from central Mexico to the
present-day Republic of Guatemala. The swift growth of their wealth and power naturally
resulted in significant changes in their old way of life. The incipient social classes were
consolidated, and the social-political structure became so elaborate that the Spanish
conquistadors found it almost as astonishing as some of the city’s architectural wonders.
Aztec Society
The stratification into social classes of what had been a mere band of nomads developed in a
rather unusual way. Once the Aztecs made contact with the advanced peoples who had inherited
Toltec culture, they acquired a profound admiration for them and wanted to link themselves to
the Toltec world by bonds of kinship. Hence, they chose as their first king, or tlatoani, a
nobleman of Toltec origin named Acamapichtli from Culhuacan. He fathered a great many
children by various Aztec women, and his descendants formed the nucleus of the social class of
nobles, or pipiltin, which increased rapidly both in size and importance. The pipiltin received a
much fuller education than other persons, were allowed to own land in their own names and
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filled the most important posts in government; the king, or tlatoani, could be chosen only from
their ranks.
The ordinary citizens formed the social class of the macehualtin. They were divided into what
have been called geographical clans, that is, groups of related families living in specific localities
and making communal use of the land assigned to them. Like the pipiltin, the macehualtin were
required to attend the communal schools, but they were not taught reading, writing, astrology,
theology or the other cultural legacies of the Toltecs. They were trained in agriculture and
warfare, and some of them became members of the artisan and merchant guilds.
In addition to these two major classes, there were also the mayeques, who worked the land for
others as slaves or serfs (though almost always for a limited period of time), and a considerable
number of actual slaves. It is necessary to point out that neither the mayeques nor the slaves were
clearly distinguished from the macehualtin as social classes.
In Tenochtitlan, Tezcoco and other cities there were groups of wise men known as tlamatinime.
These scholars carried on the study of the ancient religious thinking of the Toltecs, which
Tlacaelel had transformed into a mystical exaltation of war. Despite the popularity of the cult of
the war-god, Huitzilopochtli, the tlamatinime preserved the old belief in a single supreme god,
who was known under a variety of names. Sometimes he was called Tloque-Nahuaque, “Lord of
the Close Vicinity,” sometimes Ipalemohuani, “Giver of Life,” sometimes Moyocoyatzin, “He
who Creates Himself.” He also had two aspects, one masculine and one feminine. Thus he was
also invoked as Ometeotl, “God of Duality,” or given the double names Ometecuhtli and
Omecihuatl, “Lord and Lady of Duality,” Mictlantecuhtlitli and Mictecacihuatl, “Lord and Lady
of the Region of Death,” and others.
It is quite clear that to the tlamatinime the long list of names was merely a set of titles for a
single god, but the people believed it referred to a whole pantheon of separate deities. This, along
with the addition of tutelary gods like Huitzilopochtli, caused the Spaniards to regard the Aztecs
as an incredibly idolatrous and polytheistic nation. But a closer analysis of the religious thought
of the tlamatinime reveals that at least on the upper social levels, only one god was worshiped in
Tenochtitlan: the Lord of Duality, the Giver of Life.
Warfare in Ancient Mexico
After Tlacaelel inculcated the idea that Huitzilopochtli- the Sun had to be fed with the blood of
human sacrifices; war became a cultural institution of primary importance in Aztec life, since
war was the means of obtaining victims to appease the god’s insatiable hunger. Regardless of the
ostensible purpose of a military campaign-to conquer new territory, punish a rebellious vassal
state, or repel an aggressor-the Aztec warriors never forgot that their first duty was to take
captives to be sacrificed. This religious conception of warfare motivated the expansion of the
Aztec empire, but it also contributed to its destruction by the Spaniards. On several occasions the
Aztecs probably could have wiped out the Spaniards to the last man-their best chance of all was
on the Night of Sorrows-but the ceremonial elements in their attitude toward war prevented them
from taking full advantage of their opportunities.
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As in other cities in central Mexico, military training in Tenochtitlan began during early youth.
The army was made up of squads of twenty men, which were combined to form larger units of
about four hundred, under a tiachcauh who came from the same clan as the warriors he
commanded. The more important leaders were usually Eagle or Jaguar Knights, with such titles
as tlacatecatl (chief of men) and tlacochcalcatl (chief of the house of arrows).
The most important offensive weapon of the Aztecs was the Macana, a sort of paddle-shaped
wooden club edged with sharp bits of obsidian. It was so awesomely effective that on more than
one occasion during the Conquest warriors beheaded Spanish horses at a single stroke. Other
widely used arms were the atlati, or spear thrower, bows and arrows of different sizes, blowguns
and a variety of spears and lances, most of them with obsidian points. The defensive weapons
were shields made of wood or woven fibers-often elaborately painted and adorned with feathersand
quilted cotton armor. Some of the warriors also wore various types of masks and headdresses
to show that they were Eagle or Jaguar Knights or belonged to the higher military ranks.
A war or battle always commenced with a certain ritual: shields, arrows and cloaks of a special
kind were sent to the enemy leaders as a formal declaration that they would soon be attacked.
This explains the Aztecs’ surprise when the Spaniards, their guests, suddenly turned on them
without any apparent motive and-more important-without the customary ritual warning.
Pre-Hispanic Education
For over a hundred years before the Conquest, education in Tenochtitlan was compulsory for all
male children. They studied either in the specialized calmecac, of which there were at least six in
the city, or the telpochcalli, which were attended by the great majority. The students in the
calmecac were taught to read and interpret the codices and calendars; they also studied the tribe’s
history and traditions, and memorized the sacred hymns and other texts. So much emphasis was
placed on accurate memorization that after the Conquest it was possible to record many poems
and traditions that would otherwise have been lost forever. Most of the students in the calmecac
were sons of nobles or priests, but there is evidence that children of humble origin were
sometimes admitted if they showed exceptional aptitude.
Almost every sector or clan in Tenochtitlan had its own telpochcalli, dedicated to the god
Tezcatlipoca. The students were taught the fundamentals of religion and ethics, and were also
trained in the arts of war. In comparison with the calmecac, the telpochcalli offered a more basic
and practical education. As we have said, every boy had to attend one of these two types of
schools, and every father had to make a solemn vow, on the birth of a son, that he would send the
boy to school when he reached the proper age, which seems to have fluctuated between six and
nine years.
Pre-Hispanic Writing and Calendars
The highest cultures in ancient Mexico-especially the Mayas, Mixtecs, Toltecs and Aztecssucceeded
in developing their own systems of writing, as we can see from their carved
inscriptions and the few pre-Columbian codices that have been preserved. The Aztec system was
a combination of pictographic, ideographic and partially phonetic characters or glyphs,
representing numerals, calendar signs, names of persons, place names, etc. The Aztecs came
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closest to true phonetic writing in their glyphs for place names, some of which contained
phonetic analyses of syllables or even of letters. For example, the sounds a, e and o were
indicated by the symbols for water (ati), bean (etl) and road (otli). The paper used in the codices
was made by pounding and burnishing strips of bark from the amate tree (ficus petiolaris). The
illustrations in the present book have been adapted from post-Hispanic codices, of course, but the
original artists used the old modes to depict their version of the Conquest.
Like the Mixtecs and Mayas, the Aztecs had two principal types of calendars. One was the
xiupohualli, or “year-count,” based on the astronomical year and made up of eighteen groups or
months of twenty days each, with a remaining period of five days, called nemontemi, “those who
are there,” that was considered extremely unlucky. Despite the additional five days at the end, it
became obvious that the calendar was moving ahead of the actual year, and therefore an extra
day was added to every fourth year, as with our leap year. The other form of calendar was the
tonalpohualli, or “day-count.” It was not based on the astronomical year, for its twenty months
had only thirteen days each; instead it was calibrated to a fifty-two-year “century.” The
xiupohualli and tonalpobualli were related in various ways, but the whole topic of preHispanic
calendars is far too complicated to be explained in a brief space. We have kept a few of the Aztec
year, month and day names in this book, with explanatory footnotes where needed.
Indigenous Literature
The literary “remains” that have survived the Conquest and the intervening years are not as well
known as the sculpture and architecture of ancient Mexico, but they are surprisingly rich and
abundant. As we have seen, the Aztecs, Mayas and other peoples had their own modes of
writing, and some of the pre-Conquest codices are still in existence. In addition, the system of
memorization employed in the calmecac and telpochcalli preserved many of the ancient hymns,
myths, epic narratives and other literary compositions. It is true that the Spanish conquistadors -
along with certain churchmen – burned almost all of the codices and destroyed the pre-Hispanic
centers of education. But a few remarkable missionaries, particularly Bernardino de Sahagun and
Diego de Duran, undertook to gather up whatever they could of indigenous literature. They
managed to acquire a few codices that had escaped the flames, but their major accomplishment
was to save a great many of the old songs and narratives that were still faithfully remembered
after the Conquest. They worked out means of writing the native languages with the Latin
alphabet, and this enabled them-and their Indian pupils-to record the texts in the original words.
Dr. Angel Maria Garibay K., the most important modern authority on pre-Hispanic literature, has
shown that more than forty manuscripts containing Aztec literature are extant in various
European and American libraries. They offer a broad range of literary types: religious, lyric, epic
and dramatic poetry, and prose history, legends, moral teachings, etc. Some of them also present
poems and prose narratives describing the Conquest, written or dictated in Nahuatl by persons
who witnessed that tragic drama with their own eyes, and the major part of this book is made up
of selections from these indigenous accounts. The Appendix gives a brief description of the main
sources from which we have drawn.
Pronunciation of Nahuatl Words
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The Nahuatl language, which is also known as Aztec or Mexican, is part of the great Uto-Aztec
linguistic family. It has been spoken in central and southern Mexico, as well as in various parts
of Central America, from Toltec times to the present.
Written Nahuatl, using the Latin alphabet, was introduced by the Spanish missionaries soon after
the Conquest. With the exception of x, which is pronounced like the English sh, the letters have
the same phonetic value as in Spanish.
Practically all Nahuatl words are accented on the next to last syllable. This is often indicated
today by accents used according to rules of Spanish accentuation.
Chapter One
Omens Foretelling the Arrival of the Spaniards
Introduction
The documents presented in the first thirteen chapters relate the events that began a few years
before the arrival of the Spaniards on the east coast of Mexico and ended with the fall of
Tenochtitlan to the conquistadors. The last two chapters offer, by way of conclusion, a somewhat
different account of the Conquest written in 1528 by the anonymous informants of Tlatelolco,
and three of the icnocuicatl (threnodies, or songs of sorrow) lamenting the defeat and destruction
of the Aztec capital.
The texts have been arranged to give a chronological narrative of the Conquest, and they contain
a number of obvious
discrepancies and contradictions. We have not attempted to solve all of the problems which these
discrepancies pose for the historian. Our fundamental concern is with the human interest of the
accounts, which reveal how the Nahuas interpreted the downfall of their civilization. This first
chapter begins with a passage from the Codex Florentino; the original text is in the Nahuatl of
Sahagun’s native informants. It is followed by two selections from the Historia de Tlaxcala by
Diego Munoz Camargo, who married into the nobility of Tlaxcala. The Tlaxcaltecas allied
themselves with Cortes, and Munoz Camargo wrote from their point of view, but his description
of the omens which appeared in Mexico agrees quite closely with that of Sahagun’s informants.
The Omens as Described by Sahagun’s Informants
The first bad omen: Ten years before the Spaniards first came here, a bad omen appeared in the
sky. It was like a flaming ear of corn, or a fiery signal, or the blaze of daybreak; it seemed to
bleed fire, drop by drop, like a wound in the sky. It was wide at the base and narrow at the peak,
and it shone in the very heart of the heavens.
This is how it appeared: it shone in the eastern sky in the middle of the night. It appeared at
midnight and burned till the break of day, but it vanished at the rising of the sun. The thine
during which it appeared to us was a full year, beginning in the year 12-House.
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When it first appeared, there was great outcry and confusion. The people clapped their hands
against their mouths; they were amazed and frightened, and asked themselves what it could
mean.
The second bad omen: The temple of Huitzilopochtli burst into flames. It is thought that no one
set it afire, that it burned down of its own accord. The name of its divine site was Tlacateccan
[House of Authority].
And now it is burning, the wooden columns are burning! The flames, the tongues of fire shoot
out, the bursts of fire shoot up into the sky!
The flames swiftly destroyed all the woodwork of the temple. When the fire was first seen, the
people shouted: “Mexicanos, come running! We can put it out! Bring your water jars … ! ” But
when they threw water on the blaze it only flamed higher. They could not put it out, and the
temple burned to the ground.
The third bad omen: A temple was damaged by a lightning-bolt. This was the temple of
Xiuhtecuhtli which was built of straw, in the place known as Tzonmolco. It was rainIng that day,
but it was only a light rain or a drizzle, and no thunder was heard. Therefore the lightning-bolt
was taken as an omen. The people said: “The temple was struck by a blow from the sun.”
The fourth bad omen: Fire streamed through the sky while the sun was still shining. It was
divided into three parts. It flashed out from where the sun sets and raced straight to where the sun
rises, giving off a shower of sparks like a red-hot coal. When the people saw its long train
streaming through the heavens, there was a great outcry and confusion, as if they were shaking a
thousand little bells.
The fifth bad omen: The wind lashed the water until it boiled. It was as if it were boiling with
rage, as if it were shattering itself in its frenzy. It began from far off, rose high in the air and
dashed against the walls of the houses. The flooded houses collapsed into the water. This was in
the lake that is next to us.
The sixth bad omen: The people heard a weeping woman night after night. She passed by in the
middle of the night, wailing and crying out in a loud voice: “My children, we must flee far away
from this city!” At other times she cried: “My children, where shall I take you?”‘
The seventh bad omen: A strange creature was captured in the nets. The men who fish the lakes
caught a bird the color of ashes, a bird resembling a crane. They brought it to Motecuhzoma in
the Black House.’
This bird wore a strange mirror in the crown of its head. The mirror was pierced in the center like
a spindle whorl, and the night sky could be seen in its face. The hour was noon, but the stars and
the mamalhuaztli could be seen in the face of that mirror. Motecuhzoma took it as a great and
bad omen when he saw the stars and the mamalhuaztli.
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But when he looked at the mirror a second time, he saw a distant plain. People were moving
across it, spread out in ranks and coming forward in great haste. They made war against each
other and rode on the backs of animals resembling deer.
Motecuhzoma called for his magicians and wise men and asked them: “Can you explain what I
have seen? Creatures like human beings, running and fighting … But when they looked into the
mirror to answer him, all had vanished away, and they saw nothing.
The eighth bad omen: Monstrous beings appeared in the streets of the city: deformed men with
two heads but only one body. They were taken to the Black House and shown to Motecuhzoma,
but the moment he saw them, they all vanished away.
The Omens as Described by Munoz Camargo
Ten years before the Spaniards came to this land, the people saw a strange wonder and took it to
be an evil sign and portent. This wonder was a great column of flame which burned in the night,
shooting out such brilliant sparks and flashes that it seemed to rain fire on the earth and to blaze
like daybreak. It seemed to be fastened against the sky in the shape of a pyramid, its base set
against the ground, where it was of vast width, and its bulk narrowing to a peak that reached up
and touched the heavens. It appeared at midnight and could still be seen at dawn, but in the
daytime it was quelled by the force and brilliance of the sun. This portent burned for a year,
beginning in the year which the natives called 12-House-that is, 1517 in our Spanish reckoning.
When this sign and portent was first seen, the natives were overcome with terror, weeping and
shouting and crying out, and beating the Palms of their hands against their mouths, as is their
custom. These shouts and cries were accompanied by sacrifices of blood and of human beings,
for this was their practice whenever they thought they were endangered by some calamity.
This great marvel caused so much dread and wonder that they spoke of it constantly, trying to
imagine what such a strange novelty could signify. They begged the seers and magicians to
interpret its meaning, because no such thing had ever been seen or reported anywhere in the
world. It should be noted that these signs began to appear ten years before the coming of the
Spaniards, but that the year called 12-House in their reckoning was the year 1517, two years
before the Spaniards reached this land.
The second wonder, sign or omen which the natives beheld was this: the temple of the demon
Huitzilopochtli, in the sector named Tlacateco, caught fire and burned, though no one had set it
afire. The blaze was so great and sudden that wings of flame rushed out of the doors and seemed
to touch the sky. When this occurred, there was great confusion and much loud shouting and
wailing. The people cried: “Mexicanos! Come as quickly as you can! Bring your water jars to put
it out!” Everyone within hearing ran to help, but when they threw water on the fire, it leaped up
with even greater violence, and thus the whole temple burned down.
The third wonder and sign was this: a lightning-bolt fell on a temple of idolatry whose roof was
made of straw. The name of this temple was Tzonmolco, and it was dedicated to their idol
Xiuhtecuhtli.The bolt fell on the temple with neither flash nor thunder, when there was only a
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light rain, like a dew. It was taken as an omen and miracle which boded evil, and all burned
down.
The fourth wonder was this: comets flashed through the sky in the daytime while the sun was
shining. They raced by threes from the west to the east with great haste and violence, shooting
off bright coals and sparks of fire, and trailing such long tails that their splendor filled the sky.
When these portents were seen, the people were terrified, wailing and crying aloud.
The fifth wonder was this: the Lake of Mexico rose when there was no wind. It boiled, and boiled
again, and foamed until it reached a great height, until it washed against half the houses in the
city. House after house collapsed and was destroyed by the waters.
The sixth wonder was this: the people heard in the night the voice of a weeping woman, who
sobbed and sighed and drowned herself in her tears. This woman cried: “0 my sons, we are lost
…!” Or she cried: “0 my sons, where can I hide you…?”
The seventh wonder was this: the men whose work is in the Lake of Mexico-the fishermen and
other boatmen, or the fowlers in their canoes-trapped a dark-feathered bird resembling a crane
and took it to Motecuhzoma so that he might see it. He was in the palace of the Black Hall; the
sun was already in the west. This bird was so unique and marvelous that, no one could
exaggerate its strangeness or describe it well, A round diadem was set in its head in the form of a
clear and transparent mirror, in which could be seen the heavens, the three stars in Taurus and
the stars in the sign of the Gemini. When Motecuhzoma saw this, he was filled with dread and
wonder, for he believed it was a bad omen to see the stars of heaven in the diadem of that bird.
When Motecuhzoma looked into the mirror a second time, he saw a host of people, all armed
like warriors, coming forward in well-ordered ranks. They skirmished and fought with each
other, and were accompanied by strange deer and other creatures.
Therefore, he called for his magicians and fortune-tellers, whose wisdom he trusted, and asked
them what these unnatural visions meant: “My dear and learned friends, I have witnessed great
signs in the diadem of a bird, which was brought to me as something new and marvelous that had
never been seen before. What I witnessed in that diadem, which is pellucid like a mirror, was a
strange host of people rushing toward me across a plain. Now look yourselves, and see what I
have seen.”
But when they wished to advise their lord on what seemed to them so wondrous a thing, and to
give him their judgments, divinations and predictions, the bird suddenly disappeared; and thus
they could not offer him any sure opinion.
The eighth wonder and sign that appeared in Mexico: the natives saw two men merged into one
body-these they called tlacantzolli (“men-squeezed-together”) -and others who had two heads but
only one body. They were brought to the palace of the Black Hall to be shown to the great
Motecuhzoma, but they vanished as soon as he had seen them, and all these signs and others
became invisible. To the natives, these marvels augured their death and ruin, signifying that the
end of the world was coming and that other peoples would be created to inhabit the earth. They
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were so frightened and grief-stricken that they could form no judgment about these things, so
new and strange and never before seen or reported.
The Wonders and Signs Observed in Tlaxcala
Other signs appeared here in this province of Tlaxcala, a little before the arrival of the Spaniards.
The first sign was a radiance that shone in the east every morning three hours before sunrise.
This radiance was in the form of a brilliant white cloud which rose to the sky, and the people
were filled with dread and wonder, not knowing what it could be.
They also saw another marvelous sign: a whirlwind of dust that rose like a sleeve from the top of
the Matlalcueye, now called the Sierra de Tlaxcala.’ This sleeve rose so high that it seemed to
touch the sky. The sign appeared many times throughout a whole year and caused the people
great dread and wonder, emotions which are contrary to their bent and to that of their nation.
They could only believe that the gods had descended from heaven, and the news flew through
the province to the smallest villages. But however this may have been, the arrival of a strange
new people was at last reported and confirmed, especially in Mexico, the head of this empire and
monarchy.
Chapter Two
First Reports of the Spaniards’ Arrival
Introduction
The Cronica Mexicana by Fernando Alvarado Tezozomoc relates how Motecuhzoma consulted
various seers and magicians to learn whether the omens meant an approaching war or some other
crisis. They could not give him a satisfactory answer. However, a poor macehual (common man)
arrived shortly afterward from the Gulf coast, bringing the first word of the appearance of
“towers or small mountains floating on the waves of the sea.” A later report said that the
mountains bore a strange people who “have very light skin, much lighter than ours. They all have
long beards, and their hair comes only to their ears.”
Motecuhzoma was even more distressed by this news than he had been by the omens. Therefore,
he sent messengers and gifts to the strangers, believing that they might be Quetzalcoatl and other
divinities returning to Mexico, as the codices and traditions promised they would.
Motecuhzoma Questions the Magicians
Motecuhzoma summoned the chief officials of all the villages. He told them to search their
villages for magicians and to bring him any they found. The officials returned with a number of
these wizards, who were announced and then brought in to the king’s presence. They knelt before
him, with one knee on the floor, and did him & greatest reverence. He asked them: “Have you
not seen strange omens in the sky or on the earth? In the caves under the earth, or in the lakes
and streams? A weeping woman, or strange men? Visions, or phantasms, or other such things?”
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But the magicians had not seen any of the omens that Motecuhzoma sought to understand, and
therefore could not advise him. He said to his petlacalcatll [head steward): "Take these villains
away, and lock them up in the Cuauhcalco prison. They shall tell me against their will." The next
day he called for his pettacalcatl and said to him: "Tell the magicians to say what they believe:
whether sickness is going to strike, or hunger, or locusts, or storms on the lake, or droughts, and
whether it will rain or not. If war is threatening Mexico, or if there will be sudden deaths, or
deaths caused by wild beasts, they are not to hide it from me. They must also tell me if they have
heard the voice of Cihuacoatl, for when something is to happen, she is the first to predict it, even
long before it takes place."
The magicians answered: "What can we say? The future has already been determined and
decreed in heaven, and Motecuhzoma will behold and suffer a great mystery which must come to
pass in his land. If our king wishes to know more about it, he will know soon enough, for it
comes swiftly. This is what we predict, since he demands that we speak, and since it must surely
take place, he can only wait for it."
The petlacalcatll returned to Motecuhzoma and told him openly what they had said, that what
was to come would come swiftly. Motecuhzoma was astonished to find that this agreed with the
prediction made by Nezahualpi king of Tezcoco.' He said to the petlacalcatl: "Question them
again about this mystery. Ask them if it will come from the sky or the earth, and from what
direction or place it will come, and when this will happen."
The petlacalcatl went back to the prison to question them, but when he entered and unlocked the
doors, he was terrified to discover that they were not there. He returned to Motecuhzoma and
said to him: "My lord, command that I be cut to pieces, or whatever else you wish: for you must
know, my lord, that when I arrived and opened the doors, no one was there. I have special guards
at the prison, trustworthy men who have served me for years, but none of them heard them
escape. I myself believe that they flew away, for they know how to make themselves invisible,
which they do every night, and can fly to the ends of the earth. This is what they must have
done."
Motecuhzoma said: "Let the villains go. Call the chiefs together, and tell them to go to the
villages where the magicians live. Tell them to kill their wives and all their children, and to
destroy their houses." He also ordered many servants to go with them to ransack the houses.
When the chiefs arrived, they killed the women by hanging them with ropes, and the children by
dashing them to pieces against the walls. Then they tore down the houses and even rooted out
their foundations.
A Macebual Arrives from the Gulf Coast
A few days later a macehual [common man] came to the city from Mictlancuauhtla. No one had
sent him, none of the officials; he came of his own accord. He went directly to the palace of
Motecuhzoma and said to him: “Our lord and king, forgive my boldness. I am from
Mictlancuauhtla. When I went to the shores of the great sea, there was a mountain range or small
mountain floating in the midst of the water, and moving here and there without touching the
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shore. My lord, we have never seen the like of this, although we guard the coast and are always
on watch.”
Motecuhzoma thanked him and said: “You may rest now.” The man who brought this news had
no ears, for they had been cut off, and no toes, for they had also been cut off.
Motecuhzoma said to his petlacalcath “Take him to the prison, and guard him well.” Then he
called for a teuctlama cazqui [priest] and appointed him his grand emissary. He said to him: “Go
to CuetlaxtIan, and tell the official in charge of the village that it is true, strange thin have
appeared on the great sea. Tell him to investigate these things himself, so as to learn what they
may signify. Tell him to do this as quickly as he can, and take the ambassador Cuitlalpitoc with
you.”
When they arrived in Cuetlaxtlan, the envoys spoke with the official in charge there, a man
named Pinotl. He listened to them with great attention and then said: “My lords, rest here with
me, and send your attendants out to the shore.” The attendants went out and came back in great
haste to report that it was true: they had seen two towers or small mountains floating on the
waves of the sea. The grand emissary said to Pinotl: “I wish to see these things in person, in
order to learn what they are, for I must testify to our lord as an eyewitness. I will be satisfied
with this and will report to him exactly what I see.” Therefore he went out to the shore with
Cuitlalpitoc, and they saw what was floating there, beyond the edge of the water. They also saw
that seven or eight of the strangers had left it in a small boat and were fishing with hooks and
lines.
The grand emissary and Cuidalpitoc climbed up into a broad- limbed tree. From there they saw
how the strangers were catching fish and how, when they were done, they returned to the ship in
their small boat. The grand emissary said: “Come, Cuitlalpitoc.” They climbed down from the
tree and went back to the village, where they took hasty leave of Pinotl. They returned as swiftly
as possible to the great city of Tenochtitlan, to report to Motecuhzoma what they had observed.
When they reached the city, they went directly to the king’s palace and spoke to him with all due
reverence and humility: “Our lord and king, it is true that strange people have come to the shores
of the great sea. They were fishing from a small boat, some with rods and others with a net. They
fished until late and then they went back to their two great towers and climbed up into them.
There were about fifteen of these people, some with blue jackets, others with red, others with
black or green, and still others with jackets of a soiled color, very ugly, like our ichtilmatli. There
were also a few without jackets. On their heads they wore red kerchiefs, or bonnets of a fine
scarlet color, and some wore large round hats like small comales, which must have been
sunshades. They have very light skin, much lighter than ours, They all have long beards, and
their hair comes only to their ears.”
Motecuhzoma was downcast when he heard this report, and did not speak a word.
Preparations Ordered by Motecubzoma
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After a long silence, Motecuhzoma finally spoke: “You are the chiefs of my own house and
palace and I can place more faith and credit in you than in anyone else because you have always
told me the truth. Go with the petlacalcati and bring me the man who is locked up in the jail, the
macehual who came as a messenger from the coast.” They went to the jail, but when they opened
the doors, they could not find him anywhere. They hurried back to tell Motecuhzom \a, who was
even more astonished and terrified than they were. He said: “It is a natural thing, for almost
everyone is a magician. But hear what I tell you now, and if you reveal anything of what I am
about to command, will bury you under my halls, and your wives and children will be killed, and
your property seized. Your houses will be destroyed to the bottom of their foundations, until the
water seeps up, and your parents and all your kin will be put to death. Now bring me in secret
two of the best artists among the silversmiths, and two lapidaries who are skillful at working
emeralds.”‘
They went and returned and said to him: “Our lord, here are the craftsmen you commanded us to
bring you.”Motecuhzoma said: “Tell them to enter.” They entered, and he said to them: “Come
here to me, my fathers. You are to know that I have called for you to have you make certain
objects. But take care that you do not reveal this to anyone, for if you do, it will mean the ruin of
your houses to their foundations, and the loss of your goods, and death to yourselves, your wives,
your children and your kin, for all shall die. Each of you is to make two objects, and you are to
make them in my presence, here in secret in this palace.”
He told one craftsman: “Make a throat-band or chain of gold, with links four fingers wide and
very thin, and let each piece and medallion bear rich emeralds in the center and at the sides, like
earrings, two by two. Then make a pair of gold bracelets, with chains of gold hanging from them.
And do this with all the haste in the world.”
He ordered the other craftsman to make two great fans with rich feathers, in the center of one
side a half-moon of gold, on the other a gold sun, both well burnished so that they would shine
from far away. He also told him to make two gold armlets rich with feathers. And he ordered
each of the lapidaries to make two double bracelets-that is, for both wrists and both ankles-of
gold set with fine emeralds.
Then he ordered his petlacalcatltl to bring in secret many canutos of gold, and plumage of the
noblest sort, and many emeralds and other rich stones of the finest quality. All of this was given
to the artisans and in a few days they had finished their work. One morning, after the king had
risen, they sent a palace hunchback to the king Motecuhzoma, to beg him to come to their
workroom.
When he entered, they showed him great reverence and said: “Our lord, the work is finished.
Please inspect it.” Motecuhzoma saw that the work was excellent, and he told them that all had
been done to his satisfaction and pleasure. He called for his petlacalcatl and said: “Give each of
these, my grandfathers, a portion of various rich cloths; and huipiles and skirts for my
grandmothers; and cotton, chiles, corn, squash seeds and beans, the same amount to each.” And
with this the craftsmen returned to their homes contented….
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Chapter Three
The Messengers’ journeys
Introduction
The native documents-principally those by Sahagun’s informants- describe the various journeys
made by Motecuhzoma’s messengers to the Gulf coasts where the strangers had appeared. The
texts describing the instructions that Motecuhzoma gave to his envoys are presented first. These
show clearly how the Nahuas attempted to explain the coming of the Spaniards by a projection of
earlier ideas: they assumed that the new arrivals were Quetzalcoatl and other dieties.
Then the documents relate how the messengers reached the coast and were received by the
Spaniards, to whom they brought gifts from Motecuhzoma. The descriptions of the gifts offered
to Cortes, and of his successful attempt to frighten the messengers by firing an arquebus in front
of them, are especially interesting.
The third part of this chapter deals with the messengers’ return to Tenochtitlan and the
information they brought back to Motecuhzoma about the Spaniards, their firearms, the animals
they rode (a species of huge “deer,” but without horns), their mastiff dogs and so on.
All the texts in this chapter are from the Codex Florentino.
Motecuhzoma Instructs His Messengers
Motecuhzoma then gave orders to Pinotl of Cuetlaxtdan and to other officials. He said to them:
“Give out this order: a watch is to be kept along all the shores at Nahuatl, Tuztlan,
Mictlancuauhtla, wherever the strangers appear.” The officials left at once and gave orders for
the watch to be kept.
Motecuhzoma now called his chiefs together: Tlilpotonque, the serpent woman, Cuappiatzin, the
chief of the house of arrows, Quetzalaztatzin, the keeper of the chalk, and Hecateupatiltzin, the
chief of the refugees from the south. He told them the news that had been brought to him and
showed them the objects he had ordered made. He said: “We all admire these blue turquoises,
and they must be guarded well. The whole treasure must be guarded well. If anything is lost,
your houses will be destroyed and your children killed, even those who are still in the womb.”
The year 13 -Rabbit now approached its end. And when it was about to end, they appeared, they
were seen again. The report of their coming was brought to Motecuhzoma, who immediately sent
out messengers. It was as if he thought the new arrival was our prince Quetzalcoatl.
This is what he felt in his heart: He has appeared! He has come back! He will come here, to the
place of his throne and canopy, for that is what he promised when be departed!
Motecuhzoma sent five messengers to greet the strangers and to bring them gifts. They were led
by the priest in charge of the sanctuary of Yohualichan. The second was from Tepoztlan; the
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third, from Tizatlan; the fourth, from Huehuetlan; and the fifth, from Mictlan the Great. He said
to them: “Come forward, my Jaguar Knights, come forward. It is said that our lord has returned
to this land. Go to meet him. Go to hear him. Listen well to what he tells you; listen and
remember.”
The Gifts Sent to the New Arrivals
Motecuhzoma also said to the messengers: “Here is what you are to bring our lord. This is the
treasure of Quetzalcoatl. This treasure was the god’s finery: a serpent mask inlaid with turquoise,
a decoration for the breast made of quetzal feathers, a collar woven in the petatillo style with a
gold disk in the center, and a shield decorated with gold and mother-of-pearl and bordered with
quetzal feathers with a pendant of the same feathers.
There was also a mirror like those which the ritual dancers wore on their buttocks. The reverse of
this mirror was a turquoise mosaic: it was encrusted and adorned with turquoises. And there was
a spear-thrower inlaid with turquoise, a bracelet of chalchihuites hung with little gold bells and
pair of sandals as black as obsidian.
Motecuhzoma also gave them the finery of Tezcatlipoca. This finery was: a helmet in the shape
of a cone, yellow with gold and set with many stars, a number of earrings adorned with little gold
bells, a fringed and painted vest with feathers as delicate as foam and a blue cloak known as “the
ringing bell,” which reached to the ears and was fastened with a knot.
There was also a collar of fine shells to cover the breast. This collar was adorned with the finest
snail shells, which seemed to escape from the edges. And there was a mirror to be hung in back,
a set of little gold bells and a pair of white sandals.
Then Motecuhzoma gave them the finery of Tlaloc.This finery was: a headdress made of quetzal
feathers, as green as if it were growing, with an ornament of gold and mother-of-pearl, earrings
in the form of serpents, made of chaicbibuites, a vest adorned with chalchihuites and a collar also
of chalchihuites, woven in the petatillo style, with a disk of gold.
There was also a serpent wand inlaid with turquoise, a mirror to be hung in back, with little bells,
and a cloak bordered with red rings.
Then Motecuhzoma gave them the finery of Quetzalcoatl. This finery was: a diadem made of
jaguar skin and pheasant feathers and adorned with a large green stone, round turquoise earrings
with curved pendants of shell and gold, a collar of chalchihuites in the petatillo style with a disk
of gold in the center, a cloak with red borders, and little gold bells for the feet.
There was also a golden shield, pierced in the middle, with quetzal feathers around the rim and a
pendant of the same feathers, the crooked staff of Ehecatl with a cluster of white stones at the
crook, and his sandals of fine soft rubber.
These were the many kinds of adornments that were known as “divine adornments.” They were
placed in the possession of the messengers to be taken as gifts of welcome along with many
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other objects, such as a golden snail shell and a golden diadem. All these objects were packed
into great baskets; they were loaded into panniers for the long journey.
Then Motecuhzoma gave the messengers his final orders. He said to them: “Go now, without
delay. Do reverence to our lord the god. Say to him: ‘Your deputy, Motecuhzoma, has sent us to
you. Here are the presents with which he welcomes you home to Mexico.”
The Messengers Contact the Spaniards
When they arrived at the shore of the sea, they were taken in canoes to Xicalanco. They placed
the baskets in the same canoes in which they rode, in order to keep them under their personal
vigilance. From Xicalanco they followed the coast until they sighted the ships of the strangers.
When they came up to the ships, the strangers asked them: “Who are you? Where are you from?”
“We have come from the City of Mexico.”
The strangers said: “You may have come from there, or you may not have. Perhaps you are only
inventing it. Perhaps you are mocking us.” But their hearts were convinced; they were satisfied
in their hearts. They lowered a hook from the bow of the ship, and then a ladder, and the
messengers came aboard.
One by one they did reverence to Cortes by touching the ground before him with their lips. They
said to him: “If the god will deign to hear us, your deputy Motecuhzoma has sent us to render
you homage. He has the City of Mexico in his care. He says: ‘The god is weary.”‘
Then they arrayed the Captain in the finery they had brought him as presents. With great care
they fastened the turquoise mask in place, the mask of the god with its crossband of quetzal
feathers. A golden earring hung down on either side of this mask. They dressed him in the
decorated vest and the collar woven in the petatillo style-the collar of chalchihuites, with a disk
of gold in the center.
Next they fastened the mirror to his hips, dressed him in the cloak known as “the ringing bell”
and adorned his feet with the greaves used by the Huastecas, which were set with chalchihuites
and hung with little gold bells. In his hand they placed the shield with its fringe and pendant of
quetzal feathers, its ornaments of gold and mother-of-pearl. Finally they set before him the pair
of black sandals. As for the other objects of divine finery, they only laid them out for him to see.
The Captain asked them: “And is this all? Is this your gift of welcome? Is this how you greet
people?”
They replied: “This is all, our lord. This is what we have brought you.”
Cortes Frightens the Messengers
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Then the Captain gave orders, and the messengers were chained by the feet and by the neck.
When this had been done, the great cannon was fired off. The messengers lost their senses and
fainted away. They fell down side by side and lay where they had fallen. But the Spaniards
quickly revived them: they lifted them up, gave them wine to drink and then offered them food.
The Captain said to them: “I have heard that the Mexicans are very great warriors, very brave
and terrible. If a Mexican is fighting alone, he knows how to retreat, turn back, rush forward and
conquer, even if his opponents are ten or even twenty. But my heart is not convinced. I want to
see it for myself. I want to find out if you are truly that strong and brave.”
Then he gave them swords, spears and leather shields. He said: “It will take place very early, at
daybreak. We are going to fight each other in pairs, and in this way we will learn the truth. We
will see who falls to the ground! “
They said to the Captain: “Our lord, we were not sent here for this by your deputy
Motecuhzoma! We have come on an exclusive mission, to offer you rest and repose and to bring
you presents. What the lord desires is not within our warrant. If we were to do this, it might
anger Motecuhzoma, and he would surely put us to death.”
The Captain replied: “No, it must take place. I want to see for myself, because even in Castile
they say you are famous as brave warriors. Therefore, eat an early meal. I will eat too. Good
cheer!”
With these words he sent them away from the ship. They were scarcely into their canoes when
they began to paddle furiously. Some of them even paddled with their hands, so fierce was the
anxiety burning in their souls. They said to each other: ” My captains, paddle with all your
might! Faster, faster! Nothing must happen to us here! Nothing must happen …”
They arrived in great haste at Xicalanco, took a hurried meal there, and then pressed on until
they came to Tecpantlayacac. From there they rushed ahead and arrived in Cuetlaxtlan. As on the
previous journey, they stopped there to rest. When they were about to depart, the village official
said to them: “Rest for at least a day! At least catch your breath! “
They said: “No, we must keep on! We must report to our king, Motecuhzoma. We will tell him
what we have seen, and it is a terrifying thing. Nothing like it has ever been seen before! ” Then
they left in great haste and continued to the City of Mexico. They entered the city at night, in the
middle of the night.
Motecuhzoma Awaits Word from the Messengers
While the messengers were away, Motecuhzomaa could neither sleep nor eat, and no one could
speak with him. He thought that everything he did was in vain, and he sighed almost every
moment. He was lost in despair, in the deepest gloom and sorrow. Nothing could comfort him,
nothing could calm him, nothing could give him any pleasure.
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He said: “What will happen to us? Who will outlive it? Ah, in other times I was contented, but
now I have death in my heart! My heart bums and suffers, as if it were drowned in spices … ! But
will our lord come here? “
Then he gave orders to the watchmen, to the men who guarded the palace: “Tell me, even if I am
sleeping: ‘The messengers have come back from the sea.”‘ But when they went to tell him, he
immediately said: “hey are not to report to me here. I will receive them in the House of the
Serpent. Tell them to go there.” And he gave this order: “Two captives are to be painted with
chalk.”
The messengers went to the House of the Serpent, and Motecuhzoma arrived. The two captives
were then sacrificed before his eyes: their breasts were torn open, and the messengers were
sprinkled with their blood. This was done because the messengers had completed a difficult
mission: they had seen the gods, their eyes had looked on their faces. They had even conversed
with the gods!
The Messengers’ Report
When the sacrifice was finished, the messengers reported to the king. They told him how they
had made the journey, and what they had seen, and what food the strangers ate. Motecuhzoma
was astonished and terrified by their report, and the description of the strangers’ food astonished
him above all else.
He was also terrified to learn how the cannon roared, how its noise resounded, how it caused one
to faint and grow deaf. The messengers told him: “A thing like a ball of stone comes out of its
entrails: it comes out shooting sparks and raining fire. The smoke that comes out with it has a
pestilent odor, like that of rotten mud. This odor penetrates even to the brain and causes the
greatest discomfort. If the cannon is aimed against a mountain, the mountain splits and cracks
open. If it is aimed against a tree, it shatters the tree into splinters. This is a most unnatural sight,
as if the tree had exploded from within.”
The messengers also said: “Their trappings and arms are all made of iron. They dress in iron and
wear iron casques on their heads. Their swords are iron; their bows are iron; their shields are
iron; their spears are iron. Their deer carry them on their backs wherever they wish to go. These
deer, our lord, are as tall as the roof of a house.
“The strangers’ bodies are completely covered, so that only their faces can be seen. Their skin is
white, as if it were made of lime. They have yellow hair, though some of them have black. Their
beards are long and yellow, and their moustaches are also yellow. Their hair is curly, with very
fine strands.
“As for their food, it is like human food. It is large and white, and not heavy. It is something like
straw, but with the taste of a cornstalk, of the pith of a cornstalk. It is a little sweet, as if it were
flavored with honey; it tastes of honey, it is sweet- tasting food.
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Their dogs are enormous, with flat ears and long, dangling tongues. The color of their eyes is a
burning yellow; their eyes flash fire and shoot off sparks. Their bellies are hollow, their flanks
long and narrow. They are tireless and very powerful. They bound here and there panting, with
their tongues hanging out. And they are spotted like an ocelot.
When Motecuhzoma heard this report, he was filled with terror. It was as if his heart had fainted,
as if it had shriveled. It was as if he were conquered by despair.
Chapter Four
Motecuhzoma’s Terror and Apathy
Introduction
When Motecuhzoma heard the messengers’ report, with its description of strange animals and
other marvels, his thoughts were even more disturbed. Sahagun’s informants tell us how he sent
out his magicians and warlocks in the hope that they could harm the Spaniards with their magic,
or at least prevent them from approaching Tenochtitlan. In his uncertainty about the nature of the
strangers-he still thought they might be gods-he also sent out captives to be sacrificed in their
presence. The informants give us a vivid account of the Spaniards’ reactions to this rite.
The magicians failed completely in their attempts either to harm the Spaniards or to drive them
away. The messengers reported all this to Motecuhzoma in Tenochtitlan. Both he and his people
lived through days of intense fear, because it was now certain that the “gods” intended to march
on the Aztec capital. The informants offer what could almost be called a psychological portrait of
Motecuhzoma as he struggled with his fears and uncertainties. Finally we see how the grand
tlatoani (king) resigned himself and waited for the inevitable.
The texts in this chapter are from the Codex Florentino.
Motecuhzoma Sends Out Wizards and Magicians
It was at this time that Motecuhzoma sent out a deputation. He sent out his most gifted men, his
prophets and wizards, as many as he could gather. He also sent out his noblest and bravest
warriors. They had to take their provisions with them on the journey: live hens’ and hens’ eggs
and tortillas. They also took whatever the strangers might request, or whatever might please
them.
Motecuhzorna also sent captives to be sacrificed, because the strangers might wish to drink their
blood. The envoys sacrificed these captives in the presence of the strangers, but when the white
men saw this done, they were filled with disgust and loathing. They spat on the ground, or wiped
away their tears, or closed their eyes and shook their heads in abhorrence.
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They refused to eat the food that was sprinkled with blood, because it reeked of it; it sickened
them, as if the blood had rotted.
Motecuhzoma ordered the sacrifice because he took the Spaniards to be gods; he believed in
them and worshiped them as deities. That is why they were called “Gods who have come from
heaven.” As for the Negroes, they were called “soiled gods.”
Then the strangers ate the tortillas, the eggs and the hens, and fruit of every variety: guavas,
avocados, prickly pears and the many other kinds that grow here. There was food for the “deer”
also: reed shoots and green grasses.
Motecuhzoma had sent the magicians to learn what sort of people the strangers might be, but
they were also to see if they could work some charm against them, or do them some mischief.
They might be able to direct a harmful wind against them, or cause them to break out in sores, or
injure them in some way. Or they might be able to repeat some enchanted word, over and over,
that would cause them to fall sick, or die, or return to their own land.
The magicians carried out their mission against the Spaniards, but they failed completely. They
could not harm them in any way whatever.
Motecuhzoma Learns of the Magicians’ Failure
Therefore they hastened back to the city, to tell Motecuhzoma what the strangers were like and
how invulnerable they were. They said to him: “Our lord, we are no match for them: we are mere
nothings! ” Motecuhzoma at once gave out orders: he commanded the officials and all the chiefs
and captains, under the threat of death, to take the utmost pains to learn
The Anxiety of Motecuhzoma and His People
Motecuhzoma was distraught and bewildered; he was filled with terror, not knowing what would
happen to the city. The people were also terrified, debating the news among themselves. There
were meetings and arguments and gossip in the street; there was weeping and lamenting. The
people were downcast: they went about with their heads bowed down and greeted each other
with tears.
But there were some who attempted to encourage their neighbors, and the children were caressed
and comforted by their fathers and mothers. The chiefs said to Motecuhzoma, to fortify his heart:
“The strangers are accompanied by a woman from this land, who speaks our Nahuatl tongue. She
is called La Malinche, and she is from Teticpac. They found her there on the coast ……
It was also at this time that the Spaniards asked so many questions about Motecuhzoma. They
asked the villagers: “Is he a young man, or mature, or in his old age? Is he still vigorous, or does
he feel himself to be growing old? Is he an old man now, with white hair?” The villagers replied:
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“He is a mature man, slender rather than stout, or even thin. Or not thin but lean, with a fine
straight figure.”
Motecuhzoma Thinks of Fleeing
When Motecuhzoma heard that they were inquiring about his person, and when he learned that
the “gods” wished to see him face to face, his heart shrank within him and he was filled with
anguish. He wanted to run away and hide; he thought of evading the “gods,” of escaping to hide
in a cave.
He spoke of this to certain trusted counselors who were not faint-hearted, whose hearts were still
firm and resolute. They said: “There is the Place of the Dead, the House of the Sun, the Land of
Tlaloc, or the Temple of Cintli. You should go to one or another, to whichever you prefer.”
Motecuhzoma knew what he desired: to go to the Temple of Cintli. And his desire was made
known; it was revealed to the people.
But he could not do it. He could not run away, could not go into hiding. He had lost his strength
and his spirit, and, could do nothing. The magicians’ words had overwhelmed his heart;. they had
vanquished his heart and thrown him into confusion, so that now he was weak and listless and
too uncertain to make a decision.
Therefore he did nothing but wait. He did nothing but resign himself and wait for them to come.
He mastered his heart at last, and waited for whatever was to happen.
Chapter Five
The Spaniards March on Tlaxcala and Cholula
Introduction
Despite the efforts of Motecuhzoma’s envoys to keep the Spaniards from approaching
Tenochtitlan, Cortes decided to march inland. The two indigenous accounts presented in this
chapter the first by Sahagun’s informants, the second by the mestizo Munoz Camargo-describe
the arrival of the Spaniards in Tlaxcala and Cholula. The account by the informants mentions the
first battle between Spaniards and Indians (a group of Otomi Indians from Tecoac), after which
the Tlaxcaltecas decided to receive the strangers in peace. As soon as the Spaniards arrived, the
Tlaxcaltecas began to intrigue against nearby Cholula and the Aztecs.
There are two separate versions of what led the Spaniards to massacre the Indians in Cholula.
According to Sahagun’s informants, the massacre was inspired by the intrigues of the
Tlaxcaltecas, whose “souls burned with hatred for the people of Cholula.” According to Munoz
Camargo, the Cholultecas brought their own destruction on themselves by not surrendering to
Cortes and by treacherously murdering the envoy from Tlaxcala, Patlahuatzin, who advised them
to form an alliance with the Spaniards. This second version may have been invented by the
Tlaxcaltecas to excuse their part in the massacre; at least, there is no corroboration for it in either
the Historia of Bernal Diaz del Castillo or the Cartas I de relacion of Cortes.
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The Spaniards March Inland
(From the Codex Florentino by Sahagun’s informants)
At last they came. At last they began to march toward us.
A man from Cempoala who was known as the Tlacochcalcatl [Chief of the House of Arrows],
was the first official to welcome them as they entered our lands and cities. This man spoke
Nahuatl. He showed them the best routes and the shortest ways; he guided and advised them,
traveling at the head of the party
When they came to Tecoac, in the land of the Tlaxcaltecas, they found it was inhabited by
Otomies. The Otomies came out to meet them in battle array; they greeted the strangers with
their shields.
But the strangers conquered the Otomies of Tecoac; they utterly destroyed them. They divided
their ranks, fired the cannons at them, attacked them with their swords and shot them with their
crossbows. Not just a few, but all of them, perished in the battle.
And when Tecoac had been defeated, the Tlaxcaltecas soon heard the news; they learned what
had taken place there. They felt premonitions of death: terror overwhelmed them, and they were
filled with foreboding.
Therefore the chiefs assembled; the captains met together in a council. They talked about what
had happened, and said: “What shall we do? Shall we go out to meet them? The Otomi is a brave
warrior, but he was helpless against them: they scorned him as a mere nothing! They destroyed
the poor macehual with a look, with a glance of their eyes! We should go over to their side: we
should make friends with them and be their allies. If not, they will destroy us too. . “
The Arrival at Tlaxcala
Therefore the lords of Tlaxcala went out to meet them, bringing many things to eat: hens and
hens’ eggs and the finest tortillas. They said to the strangers: “Our lords, you are weary.”
The strangers replied: “Where do you live? Where are you from? “
They said: “We are from Tlaxcala. You have come here, you have entered our land. We are from
Tlaxcala; our city is the City of the Eagle, Tlaxcala.” (For in ancient times it was called Texcala,
and its people were known as Texcaltecas)
Then they guided them to the city; they brought them there and invited them to enter. They paid
them great honors, attended to their every want, joined with them as allies and even gave them
their daughters.
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The Spaniards asked: “Where is the City of Mexico? Is it far from here? “
They said: “No, it is not far, it is only a three-day march. And it is a great city. The Aztecs are
very brave. They are great warriors and conquerors and have defeated their neighbors on every
side.”
Intrigues Against Cholula
At this time the Tlaxcaltecas were enemies of Cholula. They feared the Cholultecas; they envied
and cursed them; their souls burned with hatred for the people of Cholula. This is why they
brought certain rumors to Cortes, so that he would destroy them. They said to him: “Cholula is
our enemy. It is an evil city. The people are as brave as the Aztecs and they are the Aztecs’
friends.”
When the Spaniards heard this, they marched against Cholula. They were guided and
accompanied by the Tlaxcaltecas and the chiefs from Cempoala, and they all marched in battle
array.’
The Massacre at Cholula
When they arrived, the Tlaxcaltecas and the men of Cholula called to each other and shouted
greetings. An assembly was held in the courtyard of the god, but when they had all gathered
together, the entrances were closed, so that there was no way of escaping.
Then the sudden slaughter began: knife strokes, and sword strokes, and death. The people of
Cholula had not foreseen it, had not suspected it. They faced the Spaniards without weapons,
without their swords or their shields. The cause of the slaughter was treachery. They died
blindly, without knowing why, because of the lies of the Tlaxcaltecas.
And when this had taken place, word of it was brought to Motecuhzoma. The messengers came
and departed, journeying back and forth between Tenochtitlan and Cholula. The common people
were terrified by the news; they could do nothing but tremble with fright. It was as if the earth
trembled beneath them, or as if the world were spinning before their eyes, as it spins during a fit
of vertigo….
When the massacre at Cholula was complete, the strangers set out again toward the City of
Mexico. They came in battle array, as conquerors, and the dust rose in whirlwinds on the roads.
Their spears glinted in the sun, and their pennons fluttered like bats. They made a loud clamor as
they marched, for their coats of mail and their weapons clashed and rattled. Some of them were
dressed in glistening iron from head to foot; they terrified everyone who saw them.
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Their dogs came with them, running ahead of the column. They raised their muzzles high; they
lifted their muzzles to the wind. They raced on before with saliva dripping from their jaws.
Negotiations Before the Battle
(From the Historia de Tlaxcala by Diego Munoz Camargo)
From this time forward, the Spaniards had no other purpose than to raise soldiers against the
Culhuas Mexicanos. They
did this within a very short time, so as to give them no opportunity to form an alliance with the
Tlaxcaltecas. And to avoid bad thoughts, as well as other new incidents and proposals, Cortes
saw to it that his new friends and confederates did not leave his side, using his wits as always, as
an astute leader, to take advantage of a favorable situation.
When the ranks were formed, the Spanish troops and the Tlaxcaltecas marched out in good
military order, with enough supplies for their great undertaking and with many important and
famous captains, all skilled in warfare according to their ancient customs and practices. These
captains were Piltecuhtli, Acxoxecatl, Tecpanecatl, Cahuecahua, Cocomitecuhtli, Quauhtotohua,
Textlipitl and many others; but because they were so many, with such a variety of names, the
others are not set down here, only the most outstanding, who were always loyal to Cortes until
the end of his conquest.
The first invasion took place at Cholula, which was governed and ruled by two lords, Tlaquiach
and Tlalchiac (for the lords who succeeded to that command were always known by those
names, which mean “Lord of what is above” and “Lord of what is below”).
Once they entered the province of Cholula, the Spaniards quickly destroyed that city because of
the great provocations given by its inhabitants. So many Cholultecas were killed in this invasion
that the news raced through the land as far as the City of Mexico. There it caused the most
horrible fright and consternation, for it was also known that the Tlaxcaltecas had allied
themselves with the “gods” (as the Spaniards were called in all parts of this New World, for want
of another name).
The Cholultecas had placed such confidence in their idol Quetzalcoatl that they believed no
human power could defeat or harm them. They thought they would be able to vanquish us in a
very short time-first, because the Spaniards were so few, and second, because the Tlaxcaltecas
had brought them against Cholula by deceit. Their faith in the idol was so complete that they
believed it would ravage their enemies with the fire and thunder of heaven, and drown them in a
vast flood of water.
This is what they believed, and they proclaimed it in loud voices: “Let the strangers come! We
will see if they are so powerful! Our god Quetzalcoatl is here with us, and they can never defeat
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him. Let them come, the weaklings: we are waiting to see them, and we laugh at their stupid
delusions. They are fools or madmen if they trust in these sodomites from Tlaxcala, who are
nothing but their women. And let the hirelings come, too: they have sold themselves in their
terror. Look at the scum of Tlaxcala, the cowards of Tlaxcala, the guilty ones! They were
conquered by the City of Mexico, and now they bring strangers to defend them! How could you
change so soon? How could you put yourselves into the hands of these foreign savages? Oh, you
frightened beggars, you have lost the immortal glory that was won by your heroes, who sprang
from the pure blood of the ancient Teochichimecas, the founders of your nation. What will
become of you, you traitors? We are waiting, and you will see how our god Quetzalcoatl
punishes his foes! “
They shouted these and other similar insults, because they believed that the enemy would surely
be consumed by bolts of fire which would fall from heaven, and that great rivers of water would
pour from the temples of their idols to drown both the Tlaxcaltecas and the Spanish soldiers.
This caused the Tlaxcaltecas no little fear and concern, for they believed that all would happen as
the Cholultecas predicted, and the priests of the temple of Quetzalcoatl proclaimed it at the top of
their voices.
But when the Tlaxcaltecas heard the Spaniards call out to St. James, and saw them burn the
temples and hurl the idols to the ground, profaning them with great zeal and determination, and
when they also saw that the idols were powerless, that no flames fell and no rivers poured outthen
they understood the deception and knew it was all falsehoods and lies.
Thus encouraged, they grew so brave that the slaughter and havoc increased beyond imagining.
Our friends also became well aware of the Spaniards’ courage; they never again plotted any
crimes, but were guided by the divine order, which was to serve Our Lord by conquering this
land and rescuing it from the power of the devil.
Before the battle began, the city of Tlaxcala sent messengers and ambassadors to Cholula to ask
for peace and to say that they were marching not against the Cholultecas but against the Culhuas,
or Culhuacanenses Mexicanos. (They were called Culhuas, it is said, because they had come
from the region of Culhuacan in the West; and Mexicanos, because the city which they founded
and made supreme was called Mexico.) The envoys told the Cholultecas that they were marching
under the command of Cortes and that they came desiring peace. They said that the people of
Cholula should fear no harm from the bearded strangers, for these were a very great and noble
people who only sought their friendship. Thus they begged the Cholultecas as friends to receive
the strangers in peace, because they would be well used by them and suffer no ill treatment, but
they also warned them not to anger the white men, for they were a very warlike, daring and
valiant people, who carried superior weapons made of white metal. They said this because there
was no iron among the natives, only copper.
They also said that the strangers brought arms which could shoot fire, and wild animals on
leashes; that they were dressed and shod in iron, and had powerful crossbows, and lions and
ounces so ferocious that they ate people (meaning the fierce greyhounds and mastiffs which the
Spaniards had brought with them); and that against this might the Cholultecas could not prevail,
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or even defend themselves, if they angered the “gods” and did not surrender peacefully, as they
should do to avoid greater harm. And they counseled them as friends to act in this manner.
Death of the Envoy from Tlaxcala
But the Cholultecas paid no attention to these words, preferring to die rather than surrender.
Rejecting the good counsel of the Tlaxcaltecas, they flayed the face of Patlahuatzin, the
ambassador, a man of great repute and valor. They did the same to his arms, which they flayed to
the elbows, and they cut his hands at the wrists so that they dangled. In this cruel fashion they
sent him away, saying: “Go back, and tell the Tlaxcaltecas and those other beggars, or gods, or
whatever they are, that this is how we invite them to come. This is the answer we send them.”
The ambassador returned in great agony, victim of an outrage that caused much horror and grief
in the republic, because he was one of the worthiest and most handsome men of this land. He
died in the service of his homeland and republic, where his fame is eternal among his people,
who keep his memory alive in their songs and sayings.
The Tlaxcaltecas were enraged at this inhuman treatment of Patlahuatzin. They took such
unthinkable cruelty as a great affront, since all ambassadors were traditionally respected and
honored by foreign kings and lords, to whom they reported the treaties, wars and other events
that took place in these provinces and kingdoms. Therefore they said to Cortes: “Most valiant
lord, we wish to accompany you, in order to seek vengeance against Cholula for its insolent
wickedness, and to conquer and destroy that city and its province. A people so obstinate and
vicious, so evil and tyrannous, should not remain alive. And if there were no other cause than
this, they would deserve eternal punishment, for they have not thanked us for our good counsel,
but have scorned and despised us because of our love for you.”
The valiant Cortes answered them with a stern face: “Have no fear. I promise you revenge.” And
he kept this promise, waging a cruel war in which vast multitudes were slaughtered, as is
recorded in the chronicles.
The Cholultecas said that their foes would all be drowned by their idol Quetzalcoatl. This was
the most venerated idol among the many that were worshipped in this land, and its temple at
Cholula was considered a shrine of the gods. They said that when the crust was scraped from a
portion of the limed surface of the temple, water gushed out. To save themselves from drowning,
they sacrificed children of two or three years of age and mixed their blood with lime to make a
kind of cement with which to stop up the springs and founts. They said that if they were ever in
danger during a war with the white gods and the Tlaxcaltecas, they would break open all the
mortared surfaces, from which a flood of water would pour forth to drown their enemies. And
when they saw how hard pressed they were, they set to work.
The Destruction of Cholula
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But none of their expectations was fulfilled, and they lost all hope. Of those who died in the
battle of Cholula, the greater number hurled themselves from the temple pyramid in their despair
and they also hurled the idol of Quetzalcoatl headfirst from the pyramid, for this form of suicide
had always been a custom among them. They were as rebellious and contemptuous as any stiffnecked,
ungovernable people, and it was their custom to die in a manner contrary to that of other
nations that is, to die headlong. In the end, the greater part of them died in despair, by killing
themselves.
When the battle of Cholula was finished, the Cholultecas understood and believed that the God
of the white men, who were His most powerful sons, was more potent than their own. Our
friends the Tlaxcaltecas, seeing themselves in the very thick of that battle and massacre, called
upon St. James the Apostle, shouting his name in loud voices: “Santiago! ” And from that day to
this, when they are in some difficulty or danger, the Tlaxcaltecas invoke the saint.
They made use of a very good counsel given them by Cortes, so that they could be distinguished
and would not die among the enemy by mistake. Since their weapons and emblems and those of
the enemy were almost the same, with only the slightest differences, and since there was such a
great multitude of people on both sides, some means of identification was a necessity. Otherwise,
in the press of battle, they would have killed their own warriors without knowing it. Therefore
they wore plaited garlands of feather-grass on their heads, in order to recognize each other; and
the counsel proved to be of considerable value.
When Cholula had been stormed and destroyed, and a great host of people killed and plundered,
our armies marched forward again, causing terror wherever they went, until the news of the
destruction spread through the whole land. The people were astonished to hear such strange
reports, and to learn how the Cholultecas were defeated and slain in so short a time, and how
their idol Quetzalcoatl had not served them in any way.
Chapter Six
The Gifts of Gold: The God Tezcatlipoca Appears
Introduction
After the destruction of Cholula, the Spaniards continued to march toward the Valley of Mexico,
accompanied by their allies from Tlaxcala. The texts by Sahagun’s informants, from which the
passages in this chapter are taken, describe two incidents of particular interest.
When the army was among the volcanoes, in what the Indians called the Eagle Pass, it was met
by new envoys from Motecuhzoma, headed by Tzihuacpopocatzin. The envoys presented many
objects of gold to the strangers, and then observed their reactions to the gifts: “The Spaniards
burst into smiles…. They hungered like pigs for that gold. – . .”
Second, the texts report the deceit of Tzihuacpopocatzin, who attempted-apparently on
Motecuhzoma’s orders-to pass himself off as Motecuhzoma. This effort failed, and another series
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of envoys was sent out-magicians again-in the hope of stopping the conquistadors. But the
wizards retired before the mysterious presence of a pretended drunkard, who foretold the ruin of
Mexico and showed them portents. They thought the god Tezcatlipoca had appeared to them, and
they hurried back to Tenochtitlan to tell Motecuhzoma. The great Aztec tiatoani was even more
depressed than before and waited fatalistically for what was to come.
The Spaniards See the Objects of Gold
Then Motecuhzoma dispatched various chiefs. Tzihuac popocatzin was at their head, and he took
with him a great many of his representatives. they went out to meet the Spaniards in the vicinity
of Popocatepetl and lztactepetl, there in the Eagle Pass.
They gave the “gods” ensigns of gold, and ensigns of quetzal feathers, and golden necklaces.
And when they were given these presents, the Spaniards burst into smiles; their eyes shone with
pleasure; they were delighted by them. They picked up the gold and fingered it like monkeys;
they seemed to be transported by joy, as if their hearts were illumined and made new.
The truth is that they longed and lusted for gold. Their bodies swelled with greed, and their
hunger was ravenous; they hungered like pigs for that gold. They snatched at the golden ensigns,
waved them from side to side and examined every inch of them. They were like one who speaks
a barbarous tongue: everything they said was in a barbarous tongue.
Tzihuacpopocatzin Pretends to Be Motecuhzoma
When they saw Tzihuacpopocatzin, they asked: “Is this Motccuhzoma, by any chance? ” They
asked this of their allies, the liars from Tlaxcala and Cempoala, their shrewd and deceitful
confederates.
They replied: “He is not Motecuhzoma, our lords. He is his envoy Tzihuacpopocatzin.”
The Spaniards asked him: “Are you Motecuhzoma, by any chance?”
“Yes,” he said, “I am your servant. I am Motecuhzoma.”
But the allies said: “You fool! Why try to deceive us?
Who do you think we are?” And they said:
You cannot deceive us; you cannot make fools of us. You cannot frighten us; you cannot blind
our eyes. You cannot stare us down; we will not look away. You cannot bewitch our eyes or turn
them aside. You cannot dim our eyes or make them swoon. You cannot fill them with dust or
shut them with slime.
“You are not Motecuhzoma: he is there in his city. He cannot hide from us. Where can he go?
Can he fly away like a bird? Can he tunnel the earth?
Can he burrow into a mountain, to hide inside it?
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We are coming to see him, to meet him face to face.
We are coming to hear his words from his own lips.”
They taunted and threatened the envoys in this fashion, and the gifts of welcome and the
greetings were another failure. Therefore the envoys hastened back to the city.
The Apparition of Tezcatlipoca
But then there was another series of envoys: magicians, wizards and priests. They also left the
city and went out to meet the strangers, but they were completely helpless: they could not blind
their eyes or overcome them in any way.
They even failed to meet and speak with the “gods,” because a certain drunkard blundered across
their path. He used the gestures that are used by the people of Chalco, and he was dressed like a
Chalca, with eight cords of couch-grass across his breast. He seemed to be very drunk; he
feigned drunkenness; he pretended to be a drunkard.
He came up to them while they were about to meet the Spaniards. He rushed up to the
Mexicanos and cried: “Why have you come here? For what purpose? What is it you want? What
is Motecuhzoma trying to do? Has he still not recovered his wits? Does he still tremble and beg?
He has committed many errors and destroyed a multitude of people. Some have been beaten and
others wrapped in shrouds; some have been betrayed and others mocked and derided.”
When the magicians heard these words, they tried in vain to approach him. They wanted to ask
his help, and they hurriedly built him a small temple and altar and a seat made of couch- grass.
But for a while they could not see him.
They labored in vain, they prepared his temple in vain, for he spoke to them only in oracles. He
terrified them with his harsh reproofs and spoke to them as if from a great distance:
“Why have you come here? It is useless. Mexico will be destroyed! Mexico will be left in ruins!”
He said: “Go back, go back! Turn your eyes toward the city. What was fated to happen has
already taken place!
They looked in the direction of Tenochtitlan. The temples were in flames, and so were the
communal halls, the religious schools and all the houses. It was as if a great battle were raging in
the city.
When the magicians saw this, they lost heart. They could not speak clearly, but talked as if they
were drunk: “It was not proper for us to have seen this vision. Motecuhzoma himself should have
beheld it! This was not a mere mortal. This was the young Tezcathpoca! “
Suddenly the god disappeared, and they saw him no longer. The envoys did not go forward to
meet the Spaniards; they did not speak with them. The priests and magicians turned and went
back to report to Motecuhzoma.
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Motecuhoma’s Despair
When the envoys arrived in the city, they told Motecuhzoma what had happened and what they
had seen. Motecuhzoma listened to their report and then bowed his head without speaking a
word. For a long time he remained thus, with his head bent down. And when he spoke at last, it
was only to say: “What help is there now, my friends? Is there a mountain for us to climb?
Should we run away? We are Mexicanos: would this bring any glory to the Mexican nation?
“Pity the old men, and the old women, and the innocent little children. How can they save
themselves? But there is no help. What can we do? Is there nothing left us?
“We will be judged and punished. And however it may be, and whenever it may be, we can do
nothing but wait.”
Chapter Seven
The Spaniards Are Welcomed in Tezcoco
Introduction
The Spaniards pushed on toward Tenochtitlan, coming down out of the mountains by way of
Tlalmanalco. Shortly after their descent, Prince Ixtlilxochitl of Tezcoco (brother of Cacama, the
lord of Tezcoco) left his city with a group of followers to greet Cortes in peace.
The Codex Ramirez preserves a few fragments in Spanish of an older, indigenous account of this
episode, of which the Nahuatl original has been lost. According to this account, it was Prince
Ixtlilxochit1 who persuaded the people of Tezcoco, resentful of Aztec domination, to join forces
with the conquistadors. The same account states that Cortes then visited the city of Tezcoco, but
this statement is not corroborated in any other source. Bernal Diaz del Castillo, Sahagun’s
informants and Fernando de Alva Ixthlxochitl do not mention such a visit; they say only that the
Spaniards marched to Ixtapalapa and from there to the Aztec capital.
The Codex Ramirez contains several anecdotes of interest and importance, especially the
reaction of Yacotzin, the prince’s mother, when her son asked her to change her religion. It also
describes how Motecuhzoma responded to the news that the Spaniards were approaching
Tezcoco. He ordered a last meeting of his chiefs, to discuss whether the strangers should be
welcomed or repulsed when they arrived at Tenochtitlan. Despite Cuitlahuac’s gloomy
predictions, he finally decided to receive them in peace.
The March to Tezcoco
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When the Spaniards looked down from the mountain heights, they were delighted to see so many
villages and towns. Some suggested that they should return to Tlaxcala until they could increase
their forces, but Cortes urged them on, and the march to Tezcoco was begun.
They spent that night in the mountains and set out again the next day. After they had marched a
few miles, they were met by Ixtlilxochitl and his brothers with a large company of followers.
Cortes distrusted them at first; but when he learned, through signs and translations, that they had
come out to meet the Spaniards as friends, he was greatly pleased. The Christians pointed to their
Captain, and Ixthlxochitl approached him and greeted him with smiles and obeisances, to which
Cortes responded in the Spanish fashion. The prince was astonished to see a man with such white
skin and with a beard and with so much courage and majesty, while Cortes, in turn, was
astonished by the prince and his brothers-especially by Tecocoltzin, who was as white as any of
the Spaniards.
At last, with La Malinche and Aguilar as interpreters, Ixtlilxochitl begged Cortes to accompany
him to Tezcoco, so that he and his people might serve him. Cortes thanked the prince and
accepted his invitation.
The Arrival at the City
At the request of Ixtlilxochitl, Cortes and his men ate the gifts of food that had been brought out
from Tezcoco. Then they walked to the city with their new friends, and all the people came out
to cheer and welcome them. The Indians knelt down and adored them as sons of the Sun, their
gods, believing that the time had come of which their dear king Nezahualpilli had so often
spoken. The Spaniards entered the city and were lodged in the royal palace.
Word of these events was brought to the king, Motecuhzoma, who was pleased by the reception
his nephews had given Cortes. He was also pleased by what Cohuamacotzin and Ixtlilxochitl had
said to the Captain, because he believed that Ixtlilxochitl would call in the garrisons stationed on
the frontiers. But God ordered it otherwise.
Cortes was very grateful for the attentions shown him by Ixtlilxochitl and his brothers; he wished
to repay their kindness by teaching them the law of God, with the help of his interpreter Aguilar.
The brothers and a number of the other lords gathered to hear him, and he told them that the
emperor of the Christians had sent him here, so far away, in order that he might instruct them in
the law of Christ. He explained the mystery of the Creation and the Fall, the mystery of the
Trinity and the Incarnation and the mystery of the Passion and the Resurrection. Then he drew
out a crucifix and held it up.
The Christians all knelt, and Ixtlilxochitl and the other lords knelt with them.
Cortes also explained the mystery of Baptism. He concluded the lesson by telling them how the
Emperor Charles grieved that they were not in God’s grace, and how the emperor had sent him
among them only to save their souls. He begged them to become willing vassals of the emperor,
because that was the will of the pope, in whose name he spoke.
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Ixtlilxochitl Becomes a Christian
When Cortes asked for their reply, Ixtlilxochitl burst into tears and answered that he and his
brothers understood the mysteries very well. Giving thanks to God that his soul had been
illuminated he said that he wished to become a Christian and to serve the emperor. He begged for
the crucifix, so that he and his brothers might worship it, and the Spaniards wept with joy to see
their devotion.
The princes then asked to be baptized. Cortes and the priest accompanying him said that first
they must learn more of the Christian religion, but that persons would be sent to instruct them.
Ixtlilxochitl expressed his gratitude, but begged to receive the sacrament at once because he now
hated all idolatry and revered the mysteries of the true faith.
Although a few of the Spaniards objected, Cortes decided that lxtlilxochitl should be baptized
immediately. Cortes himself served as godfather, and the prince was given the name Hernando,
because that was his sponsor’s name. His brother Cohuamacotzin was named Pedro because his
godfather was Pedro de Alvarado, and Tecocoltzin was named Fernando, with Cortes sponsoring
him also. The other Christians became godfathers to the other princes, and the baptisms were
performed with the greatest solemnity. If it had been possible, more than twenty thousand
persons would have been baptized that very day, and a great number of them did receive the
sacrament.
The Reactions of Yacotzin
Ixtlilxochitl went to his mother, Yacotzin, to tell her what had happened and to bring her out to
be baptized. She replied that he must have lost his mind to let himself be won over so easily by
that handful of barbarians, the conquistadors. Don Hernando said that if she were not his mother,
he would answer her by cutting off her head. He told her that she would receive the sacrament,
even against her will, because nothing was important except the life of the soul.
Yacotzin asked her son to leave her alone for the time being. She said she would think about
what he had told her and make her decision the next day. He left the palace and ordered her
rooms to be set on fire (though others say that he found her in a temple of idolatry).
Finally she came out, saying that she wanted to become a Christian. She went to Cortes and was
baptized with a great many others. Cortes; himself was her godfather, naming her Dona Maria
because she was the first woman in Tezcoco to become a Christian. Her four daughters, the
princesses, were also baptized, along with many other women. And during the three or four days
they were in the city, the Spaniards baptized a great multitude of people.
Motecuhoma’s Final Decision
When Motecuhzoma learned what had happened in Tezcoco, he called together his nephew
Cacama, his brother Cuitlahuac and the other lords. He proposed a long discussion in order to
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decide whether they should welcome the Christians when they arrived, and if so, in what manner.
Cuitlahuac replied that they should not welcome them in any manner, but Cacama disagreed,
saying that it would show a want of courage to deny them entrance once they were at the gates.
He added that it was not proper for a great lord like his uncle to turn away the ambassadors of
another great prince. If the visitors made any demands which displeased Motecuhzoma, he could
punish their insolence by sending his hosts of brave warriors against them.
Before any one else could speak, Motecuhzoma announced that he agreed with his nephew.
Cuitlahuac warned him: “I pray to our gods that you will not let the strangers into your house.
They will cast you out of it and overthrow your rule, and when you try to recover what you have
lost, it will be too late.” With this the council came to an end. The other lords all showed by their
gestures that they approved of this last opinion, but Motecuhzoma was resolved to welcome the
Christians as friends. He told his nephew Cacama to go out to meet them and sent his brother
Cuitlahuac to wait for them in the palace at Ixtapalapa.
Chapter Eight
The Spaniards Arrive in Tenochtitlan
Introduction
The Spaniards continued their march toward the Aztec capital, accompanied by all the allies they
had brought with them from the Tlaxcala region. The account given in the texts by Sahagun’s
informants, from which the passages in this chapter are drawn, begins with a description of the
order in which the various sections of the army made their appearance. They approached the
island city from the south, by way of Ixtapalapa, and arrived in Xoloco (later called San Anton
and now part of the Avenue of San Antonio Abad) on November 8, 1519. The precise date is
recorded in the XIII relacion of Fernando de Alva Ixtilxochitl.
When Cortes and Motecuhzoma finally met at Huitzillan, on the same avenue, they greeted each
other in speeches that have been carefully preserved by Sahagun’s informants. The texts then
describe the stay of the conquistadors in Tenochtitlan and their greed for the gold objects stored
in the treasure houses.
Motecuhzoma Goes Out to Meet Cortes
The Spaniards arrived in Xoloco, near the entrance to Tenochtitlan. That was the end of the
march, for they had reached their goal.
Motecuhzoma now arrayed himself in his finery, preparing to go out to meet them. The other
great princes also adorned their persons, as did the nobles and their chieftains and knights. They
all went out together to meet the strangers.
They brought trays heaped with the finest flowers-the flower that resembles a shield; the flower
shaped like a heart; in the center, the flower with the sweetest aroma; and the fragrant yellow
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flower, the most precious of all. They also brought garlands of flowers, and ornaments for the
breast, and necklaces of gold, necklaces hung with rich stones, necklaces fashioned in the
petatillo style.
Thus Motecuhzoma went out to meet them, there in Huitzillan. He presented many gifts to the
Captain and his commanders, those who had come to make war. He showered gifts upon them
and hung flowers around their necks; he gave them necklaces of flowers and bands of flowers to
adorn their breasts; he set garlands of flowers upon their heads. Then he hung the gold necklaces
around their necks and gave them presents of every sort as gifts of welcome.
Speeches of Motecuhzoma and Cortes
When Motecuhzoma had given necklaces to each one, Cortes asked him: “Are you
Motecuhzoma? Are you the king? Is it true that you are the king Motecuhzoma?”
And the king said: “Yes, I am Motecuhzoma.” Then he stood up to welcome Cortes; he came
forward, bowed his head low and addressed him in these words: “Our lord, you are weary. The
journey has tired you, but now you have arrived on the earth. You have come to your city,
Mexico. You have come here to sit on your throne, to sit under its canopy.
“The kings who have gone before, your representatives, guarded it and preserved it for your
coming. The kings Itzcoatl, Motecuhzoma the Elder, Axayacatl, Tizoc and Ahuitzol ruled for
you in the City of Mexico. The people were protected by their swords and sheltered by their
shields.
“Do the kings know the destiny of those they left behind, their posterity? If only they are
watching! If only they can see what I see!
“No, it is not a dream. I am not walking in my sleep. I am not seeing you in my dreams…. I have
seen you at last! I have met you face to face! I was in agony for five days, for ten days, with my
eyes fixed on the Region of the Mystery. And now you have come out of the clouds and mists to
sit on your throne again.
“This was foretold by the kings who governed your city, and now it has taken place. You have
come back to us; you have come down from the sky. Rest now, and take possession of your royal
houses. Welcome to your land, my lords!
When Motecuhzoma had finished, La Malinche translated his address into Spanish so that the
Captain could understand it. Cortes replied in his strange and savage tongue, speaking first to La
Malinche: “Tell Motecuhzoma that we are his friends. There is nothing to fear. We have wanted
to see him for a long time, and now we have seen his face and heard his words. Tell him that we
love him well and that our hearts are contented.”
Then he said to Motecuhzoma: “We have come to your house in Mexico as friends. There is
nothing to fear.”
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La Malinche translated this speech and the Spaniards grasped Motecuhzoma’s hands and patted
his back to show their affection for him.
Attitudes of the Spaniards and the Native Lords
The Spaniards examined everything they saw. They dismounted from their horses, and mounted
them again, and dismounted again, so as not to miss anything of interest.
The chiefs who accompanied Motecuhzoma were: Cacama, king of Tezcoco;
Tetlepanquetzaltzin, king of Tlacopan; Itzcuauhtzin the Tlacochcalcatl, lord of Tlatelolco; and
Topantemoc, Motecuhzoma’s treasurer in Tlatelolco. These four chiefs were standing in a file.
The other princes were: Atlixcatzin [chief who has taken captives]‘; Tepeoatzin, The
Tlacochcalcatl; Quetzalaztatzin, the keeper of the chalk; Totomotzin; Hecateupatiltzin; and
Cuappiatzin.
When Motecuhzoma was imprisoned, they all went into hiding. They ran away to hide and
treacherously abandoned him!
The Spaniards Take Possession of the City
When the Spaniards entered the Royal House, they placed Motecuhzoma under guard and kept
him under their vigilance. They also placed a guard over Itzcuauhtzin, but the other lords were
permitted to depart.
Then the Spaniards fired one of their cannons, and this caused great confusion in the city. The
people scattered in every direction; they fled without rhyme or reason; they ran off as if they
were being pursued. It was as if they had eaten the mushrooms that confuse the mind, or had
seen some dreadful apparition. They were all overcome by terror, as if their hearts had fainted.
And when night fell, the panic spread through the city and their fears would not let them -sleep.
In the morning the Spaniards told Motecuhzoma what they needed in the way of supplies:
tortillas, fried chickens, hens’ eggs, pure water, firewood and charcoal. Also: large, clean cooking
pots, water jars, pitchers, dishes and other pottery. Motecuhzoma ordered that it be sent to them.
The chiefs who received this order were angry with the king and no longer revered or respected
him. But they furnished the Spaniards with all the provisions they needed-food beverages and
water and fodder for the horses.
The Spaniards Reveal Their Greed
When the Spaniards were installed in the palace, they asked Motecuhzoma about the city’s
resources and reserves and about the warriors’ ensigns and shields They questioned him closely
and demanded gold.
Motecuzoma. guided them to it. They surrounded him and crowded close with their weapons. He
walked in the center, and they formed a circle around him.
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When they arrived at the treasure house called Teucalco, the riches of gold and feathers were
brought out to them: ornaments made of quetzal feathers, richly worked shields, disks of gold,
the necklaces of the idols, gold nose plugs, gold greaves and bracelets and crowns.
The Spaniards immediately stripped the feathers from the gold shields and ensigns. They
gathered all the gold into a great mound and set fire to everything else, regardless of its value.
Then they melted down the gold into ingots. As for the precious green stones, they took only the
best of them; the rest were snatched up by the Tlaxcaltecas. The Spaniards searched through the
whole treasure house, questioning and quarreling, and seized every object they thought was
beautiful.
The Seizure of Motecuhzoma’s Treasures
Next they went to Motecuhzoma’s storehouse, in the place called Totocalco [Place of the Palace
of the Birds],’ where his personal treasures were kept. The Spaniards grinned like little beasts and
patted each other with delight.
When they entered the hall of treasures, it was as if they had arrived in Paradise. They searched
everywhere and coveted everything; they were slaves to their own greed. All of Motecuhzoma’s
possessions were brought out: fine bracelets, necklaces with large stones, ankle rings with little
gold bells, the royal crowns and all the royal finery-everything that belonged to the king and was
reserved to him only. They seized these treasures as if they were their own, as if this plunder
were merely a stroke of good luck. And when they had taken all the gold, they heaped up
everything else in the middle of the patio.
La Malinche called the nobles together. She climbed up to the palace roof and cried:
“Mexicanos, come forward! The Spaniards need your help! Bring them food and pure water.
They are tired and hungry; they are almost fainting from exhaustion! Why do you not come
forward? Are you angry with them?”
The Mexicans were too frightened to approach. They were crushed by terror and would not risk
coming forward. They shied away as if the Spaniards were wild beasts, as if the hour were
midnight on the blackest night of the year. Yet they did not abandon the Spaniards to hunger and
thirst. They brought them whatever they needed, but shook with fear as they did so. They
delivered the supplies to the Spaniards with trembling hands, then turned and hurried away.
Chapter Nine
The Massacre in the Main Temple During the Fiesta of Toxcatl
Introduction
Several indigenous texts-the Codex Ramirez, the XIII relacion of Alva Ixtlilxochitl and the
Codex Aubin-describe the massacre perpetrated during the fiesta of Toxcatl, which the Aztecs I
celebrated in honor of the god Huitzilopochtli. “This was the most important of their fiestas,”
wrote Sahagun. “It was like our Easter and fell at almost the same time.”
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Cortes had been absent from the city for twenty days when the massacre took place; he had gone
out to fight Panfilo de Narvaez, who was coming to arrest him by order of Diego Velazques,
governor of Cuba. Cortes’ deputy, Pedro de Alvarado, treacherously murdered the celebrants
when the festival was at its height.
We have chosen two different accounts of the massacre, both written originally in Nahuatl. They
describe it with a realism comparable to that of the great epic poems of classical antiquity.
The first account, by Sahagun’s native informants, tells of the preparations for the fiesta, the
sudden attack by the Spaniards in the midst of the ceremonies and the retaliation by the Indians,
who besieged the Spaniards when they took refuge in Motecuhzoma’s palace.
The second brief account is by the native author of the Codex Aubin. “From a literary
standpoint,” says Dr. Garibav, “the passage is of extraordinary merit. It shows us the living,
suffering people of Tenochtitlan as they faced the attack of the Tonatiuh (Alvarado), who was as
handsome as he was wicked.”
The Preparations for the Fiesta
The Aztecs begged permission of their king to hold the fiesta of Huitzilopochtli. The Spaniards
wanted to see this fiesta to learn how it was celebrated. A delegation of the celebrants came to
the palace where Motecuhzoma was a prisoner, and when their spokesman asked his permission,
he granted it to them.
As soon as the delegation returned, the women began to grind seeds of the chicalote. These
women had fasted for a whole year. They ground the seeds in the patio of the temple.
The Spaniards came out of the palace together, dressed in armor and carrying their weapons with
them. They stalked among the women and looked at them one by one; they stared into the faces
of the women who were grinding seeds. After this cold inspection, they went back into the
palace. It is said that they planned to kill the celebrants if the men entered the patio.
The Statue of Huitzilopochtli
On the evening before the fiesta of Toxcatl, the celebrants began to model a statue of
Huitzilopochtli. They gave it such a human appearance that it seemed the body of a living man.
Yet they made the statue with nothing but-a paste made of the ground seeds of the chicalote,
which they shaped over an armature of sticks.
When the statue was finished, they dressed it in rich feathers, and they painted crossbars over
and under its eyes. They also clipped on its earrings of turquoise mosaic; these were in the shape
of serpents, with gold rings hanging from them. Its nose plug, in the shape of an arrow, was
made of gold and was inlaid with fine stones.
They placed the magic headdress of hummingbird feathers on its head. They also adorned it with
an anecuyotl, which was a belt made of feathers, with a cone at the back. Then they hung around
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its neck an ornament of yellow parrot feathers, fringed like the locks of a young boy. Over this
they put, its nettle-leaf cape, which was painted black and decorated with five clusters of eagle
feathers.
Next they wrapped it in its cloak, which was painted with skulls and bones, and over this they
fastened its vest. The vest was painted with dismembered human parts: skulls, ears, hearts,
intestines, torsos, breasts, hands and feet. They also put on its maxtlatl, or loincloth, which was
decorated with images of dissevered limbs and fringed with amate paper. This maxtatl was
painted with vertical stripes of bright blue.
They fastened a red paper flag at its shoulder and placed on its head what looked like a sacrificial
flint knife. This too was made of red paper; it seemed to have been steeped in blood.
The statue carried a tehuehuelli, a bamboo shield decorated with four clusters of fine eagle
feathers. The pendant of this shield was blood-red, like the knife and the shoulder flag. The
statue also carried four arrows.
Finally, they put the wristbands on its arms. These bands, made of coyote skin, were fringed with
paper cut into little strips.
The Beginning of the Fiesta
Early the next morning, the statue’s face was uncovered by those who had been chosen for that
ceremony. They gathered in front of the idol in single file and offered it gifts of food, such as
round seedcakes or perhaps human flesh. But they did not carry it up to its temple on top of the
pyramid.
All the young warriors were eager for the fiesta to begin. They had sworn to dance and sing with
all their hearts, so that the Spaniards would marvel at the beauty of the rituals.
The procession began, and the celebrants filed into the temple patio to dance the Dance of the
Serpent. When they were all together in the patio, the songs and the dance began. Those who had
fasted for twenty days and those who had fasted for a year were in command of the others; they
kept the dancers in file with their pine wands. (If anyone wished to urinate, he did not stop
dancing, but simply opened his clothing at the hips and separated his clusters of heron feathers.)
If anyone disobeyed the leaders or was not in his proper place they struck him on the hips and
shoulders. Then they drove him out of the patio, beating him and shoving him from behind. They
pushed him so hard that he sprawled to the ground, and they dragged him outside by the ears. No
one dared to say a word about this punishment, for those who had fasted during the year were
feared and venerated; they had earned the exclusive title “Brothers of Huitzilopoehth.”
The great captains, the bravest warriors, danced at the head of the files to guide the others. The
youths followed at a slight distance. Some of the youths wore their hair gathered into large locks,
a sign that they had never taken any captives.
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Others carried their headdresses on their shoulders; they had taken captives, but only with help.
Then came the recruits, who were called “the young warriors.” They had each captured an enemy
or two. The others called to them: “Come, comrades, show us how brave you are! Dance with all
your hearts!
The Spaniards Attack the Celebrants
At this moment in the fiesta, when the dance was loveliest and when song was linked to song, the
Spaniards were seized with an urge to kill the celebrants. They all ran forward, armed as if for
battle. They closed the entrances and passageways, all the gates of the patio: the Eagle Gate in
the lesser palace, the Gate of the Canestalk and the Gate of the serpent of mirrors.
They posted guards so that no one could escape, and then rushed into the Sacred Patio to
slaughter the celebrants. They came on foot, carrying their swords and their wooden or metal
shields
They ran in among the dancers, forcing their way to the place where the drums were played.
They attacked the man who was drumming and cut off his arms. Then they cut off his head, and
it rolled across the floor.
They attacked all the celebrants, stabbing them, spearing them, striking them with their swords.
They attacked some of them from behind, and these fell instantly to the ground with their entrails
hanging out. Others they beheaded: they cut off their heads, or split their heads to pieces.
They struck others in the shoulders, and their arms were torn from their bodies. They wounded
some in the thigh and some in the calf. They slashed others in the abdomen, and their entrails all
spilled to the ground. Some attempted to run away, but their intestines dragged as they ran; they
seemed to tangle their feet in their own entrails. No matter how they tried to save themselves,
they could find no escape.
Some attempted to force their way out, but the Spaniards murdered them at the gates. Others
climbed the walls, but they could not save themselves. Those who ran into the communal houses
were safe there for a while; so were those who lay down among the victims and pretended to be
dead. But if they stood up again, the Spaniards saw them and killed them.
The blood of the warriors flowed like water and gathered into pools. The pools widened, and the
stench of blood and entrails filled the air. The Spaniards ran into the communal houses to kill
those who were hiding. They ran everywhere and searched everywhere; they invaded every
room, hunting and killing.
The Aztecs Retaliate
When the news of this massacre was heard outside the Sacred Patio, a great cry went up:
“Mexicanos, come running! Bring your spears and shields! The strangers have murdered our
warriors! “
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This cry was answered with a roar of grief and anger: the people shouted and wailed and beat
their palms against their mouths. The captains assembled at once, as if the hour had been
determined in advance. They all carried their spears and shields.
Then the battle began. The Aztecs attacked with javelins and arrows, even with the light spears
that are used for hunting birds. They hurled their javelins with all their strength, and the cloud of
missiles spread out over the Spaniards like a yellow cloak.
The Spaniards immediately took refuge in the palace. They began to shoot at the Mexicans with
their iron arrows and to fire their cannons and arquebuses. And they shackled Motecuhzoma in
chains.
The Lament for the Dead
The Mexicans who had died in the massacre were taken out of the patio one by one and inquiries
were made to discover their names. The fathers and mothers of the dead wept and lamented.
Each victim was taken first to his own home and then to the Sacred Patio, where all the dead
were brought together. Some of the bodies were later burned in the place called the Eagle Urn,
and others in the House of the Young Men.
Motecuhzoma’s Message
At sunset, Itzcuauhtzin climbed onto the roof of the palace and shouted this proclamation:
“Mexicanos Tlatelolcas!
Your king, the lord Motecuhzoma, has sent me to speak for him. Mexicanos, hear me, for these
are his words to you: ‘We must not fight them. We are not their equals in battle. Put down your
shields and arrows.’
“He tells you this because it is the aged who will suffer most, and they deserve your pity. The
humblest classes will also suffer, and so will the innocent children who still crawl on all fours,
who still sleep in their cradles.
“Therefore your king says: ‘We are not strong enough to defeat them. Stop fighting, and return to
your homes.’ Mexicanos, they have put your king in chains; his feet are bound with chains.”
When Itzcuauhtzin had finished speaking, there was a great uproar among the people. They
shouted insults at him in their fury, and cried: “Who is Motecuhzoma to give us orders? We are
no longer his slaves! ” They shouted war cries and fired arrows at the rooftop. The Spaniards
quickly hid Motecuhzoma and ltzcuauhtzin behind their shields so that the arrows would not find
them.
The Mexicans were enraged because the attack on the captains had been so treacherous: their
warriors had been killed without the slightest warning. Now they refused to go away or to put
down their arms.
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The Spaniards Are Besieged
The royal palace was placed under siege. The Mexicans kept a close watch to prevent anyone
from stealing in with food for the Spaniards. They also stopped delivering supplies: they brought
them absolutely nothing, and waited for them to die of hunger.
A few people attempted to communicate with the Spaniards. They hoped to win their favor by
giving them advice and information or by secretly bringing them food. But the guards found
them and killed them on the spot: they broke their necks or stoned them to death.
Once a group of porters was discovered bringing rabbit skins into the city. They let slip the fact
that other persons had been hiding in their midst. Therefore strict orders were issued to maintain
a watch over all the roads and causeways leading to the city. The porters themselves had been
sent by the chiefs of Ayotzintepec and Chinantlan. They were only performing
their duties, but the guards seized them and put them to death for no reason. They would shout:
“Here is another one!” and then kill him. And if they happened to see one of Motecuhzoma’s
servants with his glass lip plug, they slaughtered him at once, claiming: “He was bringing food to
Motecuhzoma.”
They seized anyone who was dressed like a porter or any other servant. “Here is another traitor,”
they would say. “He is bringing news to Motecuhzoma.” The prisoner would try to save his life
by pleading with them: “What are you doing, Mexicanos? I am not a traitor! ” But they would
answer: “Yes, you are. We know you are one of his servants.” And they would immediately put
him to death.
They stopped and examined everyone in the same way, studying each man’s face and questioning
him about his work. No one could walk out of doors without being arrested and accused. They
sentenced a great many people for imaginary crimes; the victims were executed for acts they had
never committed. The other servants, therefore, went home and hid themselves. They were afraid
to be seen in public: they knew what would happen to them if they fell into the hands of the
guards or the other warriors.
After they had trapped the Spaniards in the palace, the Mexicans kept them under attack for
seven days, and for twenty- three days they foiled all their attempts to break out. During this time
all the causeways were closed off. The Mexicans tore up the bridges, opened great gaps in the
pavement and built a whole series of barricades; they did everything they could to make the
causeways impassable. They also closed off the roads by building walls and roadblocks; they
obstructed all the roads and streets of the city.
The Massacre According to the Codex Aubin
Motecuhzoma said to La Malinche: “Please ask the god to hear me. It is almost time to celebrate
the fiesta of Toxcatl. It will last for only ten days, and we beg his permission to hold it. We
merely burn some incense and dance our dances. There will be a little noise because of the
music, but that is all.”
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The Captain said: “Very well, tell him they may hold it.” Then he left the city to meet another
force of Spaniards who were marching in this direction. Pedro de Alvarado, called The Sun, was
in command during his absence.
When the day of the fiesta arrived, Motecuhzoma said to The Sun: “Please hear me, my lord. We
beg your permission to begin the fiesta of our god.”
The Sun replied: “Let it begin. We shall be here to watch it”
The Aztec captains then called for their elder brothers, who were given this order: “You must
celebrate the fiesta as grandly as possible.”
The elder brothers replied: “We will dance with all our might.”
Then Tecatzin, the chief of the armory, said: “Please remind the lord that he is here, not in
Cholula. You know how they trapped the Cholultecas in their patio! They have already caused us
enough trouble. We should hide our weapons close at hand! “
But Motecuhzoma said: “Are we at war with them? I tell you, we can trust them.”
Tecatzin said: “Very well.”
Then the songs and dances began. A young captain wearing a lip plug guided the dancers; he was
Cuatlazol, from Tolnahuac.
But the songs had hardly begun when the Christians came out of the palace. They entered the
patio and stationed four guards at each entrance. Then they attacked the captain who was guiding
the dance. One of the Spaniards struck the idol in the face, and others attacked the three men who
were playing the drums. After that there was a general slaughter until the patio was heaped with
corpses.
A priest from the Place of the Canefields’ cried out in a loud voice: “Mexicanos! Who said we
are not at war? Who said we could trust them?”
The Mexicans could only fight back with sticks of wood; they were cut to pieces by the swords.
Finally the Spaniards retired to the palace where they were lodged.
Chapter Ten
The Night of Sorrows
Introduction
After disposing of Panfilo de Narvaez, Cortes returned to the city, his ranks increased by troops
from the defeated army. According to Sahagun’s informants (from whose writings this chapter is
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drawn), the Aztecs planned to fall on him from ambush; but he reached the garrison in
Tenochtitlan without hindrance and immediately ordered the cannons to be fired. The Aztecs
responded
by renewing their attack on the palace. The battle raged for four days. During a lull in the
fighting, the Spaniards dragged the dead bodies of Motecuhzoma and Itzcuauhtzin to the water’s
edge. No one knows for certain how Motecuhzoma died.
It soon became obvious to Cortes that he would have to abandon Tenochtitlan. He withdrew at
night, but the retreat was discovered, and the Aztecs avenged themselves for the massacre in the
temple patio. They attacked as the Spaniards were fleeing down the Tlacopan (now Tacuba)
causeway, and the rout was so disastrous that it has been known ever since as “la noche triste,”
the Night of Sorrows. Those who escaped the disaster found refuge in the nearby village of
Teocalhueyacan, where they were welcomed as friends; but three-fourths of the army had
perished in the retreat and in the siege that preceded it.
The chapter concludes with a brief selection from the XIII relacion by Alva Ixtilxochitl. The
Spaniards Abandon the City
At midnight the Spaniards and Tlaxcaltecas came out in closed ranks, the Spaniards going first
and the Tlaxcaltecas following. The allies kept very close behind, as if they were crowding up
against a wall. The sky was overcast and rain fell all night in the darkness, but it was a gentle
rain, more like a drizzle or a heavy dew.
The Spaniards carried portable wooden bridges to cross the canals.’ They set them in place,
crossed over and raised them again. They were able to pass the first three canals-the
Tecpantzinco, the Tzapotlan and the Atenchicalco-without being seen. But when they reached
the fourth, the Mixcoatechialtitlan, their retreat was discovered.
The Battle Begins
The first alarm was raised by a woman who was drawing water at the edge of the canal. She
cried: “Mexicanos, come running’ They are crossing the canal! Our enemies are escaping!”
Then a priest of Huitzilopochtli shouted the call to arms from the temple pyramid. His voice rang
out over the city: “Captains, warriors, Mexicanos! Our enemies are escaping! Follow them in
your boats. Cut them off, and destroy them!
When they heard this cry, the warriors leaped into the boats and set out in pursuit. These boats
were from the garrisons of Tenochtitlan and Tlatelolco,’ and were protected by the warriors’
shields. The boatmen paddled with all their might; they lashed the water of the lake until it
boiled.
Other warriors set out on foot, racing to Nonohualco and then to Tlacopan to cut off the retreat.
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The boats converged on the Spaniards from both sides of the causeway, and the warriors loosed a
storm of arrows at the fleeing army. But the Spaniards also turned to shoot at the Aztecs; they
fired their crossbows and their arquebuses. The Spaniards and Tlaxcaltecas suffered many
casualties, but many of the Aztec warriors were also killed or wounded.
The Massacre at the Canal of the Toltecs
When the Spaniards reached the Canal of the Toltecs, in Tlaltecayohuacan, they hurled
themselves headlong into the water, as if they were leaping from a cliff. The Tlaxcaltecas, the
allies from Tliliuhquitepec, the Spanish foot soldiers and horsemen, the few women who
accompanied the army-all came to the brink and plunged over it.
The canal was soon choked with the bodies of men and horses; they filled the gap in the
causeway with their own drowned bodies. Those who followed crossed to the other side by
walking on the corpses.
When they reached Petlalco, where there was another canal, they crossed over on their portable
bridge without being attacked by the Aztecs.5 They stopped and rested there for a short while,
and began to feel more like men again. Then they marched on to Popotla.
Dawn was breaking as they entered the village. Their hearts were cheered by the brightening
light of this new day: they thought the horrors of the retreat by night were all behind them. But
suddenly they heard war cries and the Aztecs swarmed through the streets and surrounded them.
They had come to capture Tlaxcaltecas for their sacrifices. They also wanted to complete their
revenge against the Spaniards.
The Aztecs harried the army all the way to Tlacopan. Chimalpopoca, the son of Motecuhzoma,
was killed in the action at Tlilyuhcan by an arrow from the crossbows. Tlaltecatzin, the Tepanec
prince, was wounded in the same action and died shortly after. He had served the Spaniards as a
guide and advisor, pointing out the best roads and short cuts.
The Spaniards Take Refuge in Teocalhueyacan
Then the Spaniards forded a small river called the Tepzolatl. Next they crossed two rivers, the
Tepzolac and the Acueco, and stopped in Otoncalpulco, where the temple patio was surrounded
by a wooden wall. They rested there in safety, catching their breath and recovering their strength.
While they were resting, the lord of Teocalhueyacan paid them a visit. He was known as The
Otomi, a title reserved for
the nobility. He greeted them and offered them the gifts of food his servants had brought:
tortillas, eggs, roast chickens, a few five hens and various kinds of fruit. He placed these
offerings in front of the Captain and said: “My lords, you are weary. You have suffered many
heartaches. We beg the gods to rest now and enjoy these gifts.”
La Malinche said: “My lord, the Captain wishes to know where you are from.”
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He answered: “Tell our lord that we are from. Teocalhueyacan. Tell him that we hope he will
visit us.”
La Malinche said: “The Captain thanks you. We shall arrive tomorrow or the day after.”
The Aztecs Recover the Spoils
As soon as it was daylight, the Aztecs cleared the dead Spaniards and Tlaxcaltecas out of the
canals and stripped them of everything they wore. They loaded the bodies of the Tlaxcaltecas
into canoes and took them out to where the rushes grow; they threw them among the rushes
without burying them, without giving them another glance.
They also threw out the corpses of the women who had been killed in the retreat. The naked
bodies of these women were the color of ripe corn, for they had painted themselves with yellow
paint.
But they laid out the corpses of the Spaniards apart from the others; they lined them up in rows
in a separate place. Their bodies were as white as the new buds of the canestalk, as white as the
buds of the maguey. They also removed the dead “stags” that had carried the “gods” on their
shoulders.
Then they gathered up everything the Spaniards had abandoned in their terror. When a man saw
something he wanted, he took it, and it became his property; he hefted it onto his shoulders and
carried it home. They also collected all the weapons that had been left behind or had fallen into
the canal-the cannons, arquebuses, swords, spears, bows and arrows-along with all the steel
helmets, coats of mail and breast- plates, and the shields of metal, wood and hide. They
recovered the gold ingots, the gold disks, the tubes of gold dust and the chalchihuite collars with
their gold pendants.
They gathered up everything they could find and searched the waters of the canal with the
greatest care. Some of them groped with their hands and others felt about with their feet. Those
who went first were able to keep their balance but those who came along behind them all fell into
the water.
The Account by Alva Ixtlilxochitl
Cortes turned in the direction of Tenochtitlan and entered the city of Tezcoco. He was received
only by a group of knights, because the legitimate sons of King Nezahualpilli had been hidden
by their servants, and the other lords were being held by the Aztecs as hostages. He entered
Tenochtitlan with his army of Spaniards and allies on the day of St. John the Baptist, without
being molested in any way.
The Mexicans gave them everything they needed, but when they saw that Cortes had no intention
of leaving the city or of freeing their leaders, they rallied their warriors and attacked the
Spaniards. This attack began on the day after Cortes entered the city and lasted for seven days.
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On the third day, Motecuhzoma climbed onto the rooftop and tried to admonish his people, but
they cursed him and shouted that he was a coward and a traitor to his country. They even
threatened him with their weapons. It is said that an Indian killed him with a stone from his sling,
but the palace servants declared that the Spaniards put him to death by stabbing him in the
abdomen with their swords.
On the seventh day, the Spaniards abandoned the city along with the Tlaxcaltecas, the
Huexotzincas and their other allies. They fled down the causeway that leads out to Tlacopan. But
before they left, they murdered King Cacama of Tezcoco, his three sisters and two of his
brothers.
There are several accounts by Indians who took part in the fighting that ensued. They tell how
their warriors killed a great many of the Spaniards and their allies, and how the army took refuge
on a mountain near Tlacopan and then marched to Tlaxcala.
Chapter Eleven
The Siege of Tenochtitlan
Introduction
The Aztecs, convinced that the Spaniards would never return to Tenochtitlan, celebrated their
fiestas again in the traditional manner, and Cuitlahuac was elected king to succeed his brother
Motecuhzoma. The Aztec kings were chosen by a council of four lords, representing the four
quarters, or phratries, into which the twenty clans of the city were evenly grouped. The council
attempted to choose the wisest and bravest man among the brothers, sons and nephews of the
previous ruler. Their choice of Cuitlahuac may have been influenced by the fact that he had
warned against allowing the Spaniards to enter Tenochtitlan (Chapter 7).
This period of normalcy was soon ended by the terrible plague that quickly spread through the
city. The plague seems to have been an epidemic of smallpox, which was previously unknown
among the Indians. One of its victims was the new king himself. Shortly afterward, the Spaniards
reappeared. They had rebuilt their army in Tlaxcala and marched to Tlacopan by way of
Tezcoco.
A number of indigenous documents describe the siege of the Aztec capital. We have chosen the
account given by Sahagun’s native informants in the Codex Florentino.
Tenochtitlan After the Departure of Cortes
When the Spaniards left Tenochtitlan, the Aztecs thought they had departed for good and would
never return. Therefore they repaired and decorated the temple of their god, sweeping it clean
and throwing out all the dirt and wreckage.
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Then the eighth month’ arrived, and the Aztecs celebrated it as always.’ They adorned the
impersonators of the gods, all those who played the part of gods in the ceremonies, decking them
with necklaces and turquoise masks and dressing them in the sacred clothing. This clothing was
made of quetzal feathers, eagle feathers and yellow parrot feathers. The finery of the gods was in
the care of the great princes.
The Plague Ravages the City
While the Spaniards were in Tlaxcala, a great plague broke out here in Tenochtitlan. It began to
spread during the thirteenth month and lasted for seventy days, striking every where in the city
and killing a vast number of our people. Sores erupted on our faces, our breasts, our bellies; we
were covered with agonizing sores from head to foot.
The illness was so dreadful that no one could walk or move. The sick were so utterly helpless
that they could only lie on their beds like corpses, unable to move their limbs or even their heads.
They could not lie face down or roll from one side to the other. If they did move their bodies,
they screamed with pain.
A great many died from this plague, and many others died of hunger. hey could not getup to
search for food, and everyone else was too sick to care for them, so they starved to death in their
beds.
Some people came down with a milder form of the disease; they suffered less than the others and
made a good recovery. But they could not escape entirely. Their looks were ravaged, for
wherever a sore broke out, it gouged an ugly pockmark in the skin. And a few of the survivors
were left completely blind.
The first cases were reported in Cuatlan. By the time the danger was recognized, the plague was
so well established that nothing could halt it, and eventually it spread all the way to Chalco. Then
its virulence diminished considerably, though there were isolated cases for many months after.
The first victims were stricken during the fiesta of Teotlecco and the faces of our warriors were
not clean and free of sores until the fiesta of Panquetzaliztli.
The Spaniards Return
And now the Spaniards came back again. They marched here by way of Tezcoco, set up
headquarters in Tlacopan and then divided their forces. Pedro de Alvarado was assigned the road
to the Tlatelolco quarter as his personal responsibility, while Cortes himself took charge of the
Coyoacan area and the road from Acachinanco to Tenochtitlan proper. Cortes knew that the
captain of Tenochtitlan was extremely brave.
The first battle began outside Tlatelolco, either at the ash pits or at the place called the Point of
the Alders, and then shifted to Nonohualco. Our warriors put the enemy to flight and not a single
Aztec was killed. The Spaniards tried a second advance but our warriors attacked them from
their boats, loosing such a storm of arrows that the Spaniards were forced to retreat again.
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Cortes, however, set out for Acachinanco and reached his goal. He moved his headquarters there,
just outside the city.
Heavy fighting ensued, but the Aztecs could not dislodge him.
The Spaniards Launch Their Brigantines
Finally the ships, a dozen in all, came from Tezcoco and anchored near Acachinanco. Cortes
went out to inspect the canals that traversed the causeways, to discover the best passages for his
fleet. He wanted to know which were the nearest, the shortest, the deepest, the straightest, so that
none of his ships would run aground or be trapped inside. One of the canals across the Xoloco
thoroughfare was so twisted and narrow that only two of the smaller ships were able to pass
through it.
The Spaniards now decided to attack Tenochtitlan and destroy its people. The cannons were
mounted in the ships, the sails were raised and the fleet moved out onto the lake. The flagship led
the way, flying a great linen standard with Cortes’ coat of arms. The soldiers beat their drums and
blew their trumpets; they played their flutes and chirimias and whistles.
When the ships approached the Zoquiapan quarter,” the common people were terrified at the
sight. They gathered their children into the canoes and fled helter-skelter across the lake,
moaning with fear and paddling as swiftly as they could. They left all their possessions behind
them and abandoned their little farms without looking back.
Our enemies seized all our possessions. They gathered up everything they could find and loaded
it into the ships in great bundles. They stole our cloaks and blankets, our battle dress, our tabors
and drums, and carried them all away. The Tlatelolcas followed and attacked the Spaniards from
their boats but could not save any of the plunder.
When the Spaniards reached Xoloco, near the entrance to Tenochtitlan, they found that the
Indians had built a wall across the road to block their progress. They destroyed it with four shots
from the largest cannon. The first shot did little harm, but the second split it and the third opened
a great hole. With the fourth shot, the wall lay in ruins on the ground.
Two of the brigantines, both with cannons mounted in their bows, attacked a flotilla of our
shielded canoes. The cannons were fired into the thick of the flotilla, wherever the canoes were
crowded closest together. Many of our warriors were killed outright; others drowned because
they were too crippled by their wounds to swim away. The water was red with the blood of the
dead and dying. Those who were hit by the steel arrows were also doomed; they died instantly
and sank to the bottom of the lake.
Defensive Tactics of the Aztecs
When the Aztecs discovered that the shots from the arquebuses and cannons always flew in a
straight line, they no longer ran away in the line of fire. They ran to the right or left or in zigzags,
not in front of the guns. If they saw that a cannon was about to be fired and they could not escape
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by running, they threw themselves to the ground and lay flat until the shot had passed over them.
The warriors also took cover among the houses, darting into the spaces between them. The road
was suddenly as empty as if it passed through a desert.
Then the Spaniards arrived in Huitzillan, where they found another wall blocking the road. A
great crowd of our warriors was hiding behind it to escape the gunfire.
The Spaniards Debark
The brigantines came up and anchored nearby. They had been pursuing our war canoes in the
open lake, but when they had almost run them down, they suddenly turned and sailed toward the
causeway. Now they anchored a short distance from the houses. As soon as the cannons in their
bows were loaded again, the soldiers aimed and fired them at the new wan.
The first shot cracked it in a dozen places, but it remained standing. They. fired again: this time it
cracked from one end to the other and crumpled to the ground. A moment later the road was
completely empty. The warriors had all fled when they saw the wall collapsing; they ran blindly,
this way and that, howling with fear.
Then the Spaniards debarked and filled in the canal. Working hurriedly, they threw in the stones
from the shattered wall, the roof beams and adobe bricks from the nearest houses, anything they
could find, until the surface of the fill was level with the causeway. Then a squad of about ten
horsemen crossed over it. They galloped to and fro, scouting both sides of the road; they raced
and wheeled and clattered back and forth. Soon they were joined by another squad that rode up
to support them.
A number of Tlatelolcas had rushed into the palace where Motecuhzoma lived before he was
slain. When they came out again, they unexpectedly met the Spanish cavalry. The lead horseman
stabbed one of the Tlatelolcas, but the wounded man was able to clutch the lance and cling to it.
His friends ran to his aid and twisted it from the Spaniard’s hands. They knocked the horseman
from his saddle, beat and kicked him as he lay on his back on the ground, and then cut off his
head.
The Spaniards now joined all their forces into one unit and marched together as far as the Eagle
Gate, where they set up the cannons they had brought with them. It was called the Eagle Gate
because it was decorated with an enormous eagle carved of stone. The eagle was flanked on one
side by a stone jaguar; on the other side there was a large honey bear, also of carved stone.
Two rows of tall columns led into the city from this gate. Some of the Aztecs hid behind the
columns when they saw the Spaniards and their guns; others climbed onto the roofs of the
communal houses. None of the warriors dared to show his face openly.
The Spaniards wasted no time as they loaded and fired the cannons. The smoke belched out in
black clouds that darkened the sky, as if night were falling. The warriors hidden behind the
columns broke from cover and fled; those on the rooftops climbed down and ran after them.
When the smoke cleared away, the Spaniards could not see a single Aztec.
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The Spaniards Advance to the Heart of the City
Then the Spaniards brought forward the largest cannon and set it up on the sacrificial stone. The
priests of Huitzilopochtli immediately began to beat their great ritual drums from the top of the
pyramid. The deep throbbing of the drums resounded over the city, calling the warriors to defend
the shrine of their god. But two of the Spanish soldiers climbed the stairway to the temple
platform, cut the priests down with their swords and pitched them headlong over the brink.
The great captains and warriors who had been fighting from their canoes now returned and
landed. The canoes were paddled by the younger warriors and the recruits. As soon as the
warriors landed, they ran through the streets, hunting the enemy and shouting: “Mexicanos, come
find them!”
The Spaniards, seeing that an attack was imminent, tightened their ranks and clenched the hilts
of their swords. The next moment, all was noise and confusion. The Aztecs charged into the
plaza from every direction, and the air was black with arrows and gunsmoke.
The battle was so furious that both sides had to pull back. The Aztecs withdrew to Xoloco to
catch their breath and dress their wounds, while the Spaniards retreated to their camp in
Acachinanco, abandoning the cannon they had set up on the sacrificial stone. Later the warriors
dragged this cannon to the edge of the canal and toppled it in. It sank at a place called the Stone
Toad.
The Aztecs Take Refuge
During this time the Aztecs took refuge in the Tlatelolco quarter. They deserted the Tenochtitlan
quarters all in one day, weeping and lamenting like women. Husbands searched for their wives,
and fathers carried their small children on their shoulders. Tears of grief and despair streamed
down their cheeks.
The Tlatelolcas, however, refused to give up. They raced into Tenochtitlan to continue the fight
and the Spaniards soon learned how brave they were. Pedro de Alvarado launched an attack
against the Point of the Alders, in the direction of Nonohualco, but his troops were shattered as if
he had sent them against a stone cliff. The battle was fought both, on dry land and on the water,
where the Indians shot at the Spaniards from their shielded canoes. Alvarado was routed and had
to draw back to Tlacopan.
On the following day, two brigantines came up loaded with troops, and the Spaniards united all
their forces on the outskirts of Nonohualco. The soldiers in the brigantines came ashore and the
whole army marched into the very heart of Tenochtitlan. Wherever they went, they found the
streets empty, with no Indians anywhere in sight.
The Last Stand
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Then the great captain Tzilacatzin arrived, bringing with him three large, round stones of the
kind used for building walls. He carried one of them in his hand; the other two hung from his
shield. When he hurled these stones at the Spaniards, they turned and fled the city.
Tzilacatzin’s military rank was that of Otomi, and he clipped his hair in the style of the Otomies.”
He scorned his enemies, Spaniards as well as Indians; they all shook with terror at the mere sight
of him.
When the Spaniards found out how dangerous he was, they tried desperately to kill him. They
attacked him with their swords and spears, fired at him with their crossbows and arquebuses, and
tried every other means they could think of to kill or cripple him. Therefore he wore various
disguises to prevent them from recognizing him.
Sometimes he wore his lip plug, his gold earrings and all the rest of his full regalia, but left his
head uncovered to show that he was an Otomi. At other times he wore only his cotton armor,
with a thin kerchief wrapped around his head. At still other times, he put on the finery of the
priests who cast the victims into the fire: ” a plumed headdress with the eagle symbol on its crest,
and gleaming gold bracelets on both arms, and circular bands of gleaming gold on both ankles.
The Spaniards came back again the next day. They brought their ships to a point just off
Nonohualco, close to the place called the House of Mist. Their other troops arrived on foot,
along with the Tlaxcaltecas. As soon as they had formed ranks, they charged the Aztec warriors.
The heaviest fighting began when they entered Nonohualco. None of our enemies and none of
our own warriors escaped harm. Everyone was wounded, and the toll of the dead was grievous
on both sides. The struggle continued all day and all night.
Only three captains never retreated. They were contemptuous of their enemies and gave no
thought whatever to their own safety. The first of these heroes was Tzoyectzin; the second,
Temoctzin; and the third, the great Tzilacatzin.
At last the Spaniards were too exhausted to keep on fighting. After one final attempt to break the
Aztec ranks, they withdrew to their camp to rest and recover, with their allies trailing behind.
Chapter Twelve
Spanish Raids into the Besieged City
Introduction
The native documents describing the long siege of Tenochtitlan present a number of vivid and
dramatic scenes. We have selected the account by Sahagun’s informants preserved in the Codex
Florentino.
During one of the first attacks by the Spaniards, the Aztecs took fifteen prisoners and then
sacrificed them within sight of their Comrades, who were watching helplessly from the
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barkentines. The text also describes the tragic suffering of the besieged inhabitants, the Spanish
raid on the Tlatelolco market place, the burning of the temple, and the almost incredible courage
with which the Aztecs again and again drove back the invaders.
The narrative continues with a description of how the Spaniards set up a catapult on the platform
of the small temple in the Tlatelolco market, and concludes with the final efforts of the Aztecs to
save their capital. Cuauhtemoc, who had succeeded his uncle Cuitlahuac when the latter died of
the plague, decided to dress a captain named Opochtzin in the regalia of King Ahuitzotl,
Motecuhzoma’s predecessor. It was believed that this regalia invested its wearer with the
attributes of the war god Huitzilopochtli, and that if Opochtzin could wound a Spaniard with the
sacred arrow called “the fire-serpent,” victory was still possible. The attempt was unsuccessful
and was followed by a brief period of calm that ended with the final agonies of the dying city.
Fifteen Spaniards Are Captured and Sacrificed
The warriors advanced to the sound of flutes. They shouted their war cries and beat their shields
like drums. They pursued the Spaniards, harried and terrified them, and at last took fifteen of
them prisoners. The rest of the Spaniards retreated to their ships and sailed out into the middle of
the lake.
The prisoners were sacrificed in the place called Tlacochcalco [House of the Arsenal]. Their
captors quickly plundered them, seizing their weapons, their cotton armor and everything else,
until they stood naked. Then they were sacrificed to the god, while their comrades on the lake
watched them being put to death.
Two of the barkentines sailed to Xocotitlan again. They anchored there, and the Spaniards began
attacking the houses along the shore. But when Tzilacatzin and other warriors saw what was
happening, they ran to the defense and drove the invaders into the water.
On another occasion, the barkentines approached Coyo nacazco to attack the houses. As the
ships closed in, a few Spaniards jumped out, ready for battle. They were led by Castaneda and by
Xicotencatl, who was wearing his headdress of quetzal feathers.
Then Castaneda shot the catapult. It struck one of the Aztecs in the forehead and he fell dead
where he was standing. The warriors charged the Spaniards, driving them into the water, and
then loosed a hail of stones from their slings. Castaneda would have been killed in this action if a
barkentine had not taken him aboard and sailed away toward Xocotitlan.
Another barkentine was anchored near the turn in the Wall, and still another n